SUMMARY: Restoring root partition

From: Lance Eric Greenwade (leg@inel.gov)
Date: Thu Oct 08 1992 - 00:23:17 CDT


Once again, this list responded quickly and correctly. A real
life saver.

The problem was:
        We have a Sparc 1+, 4.1.2, that apparently has a problem with
        it's root file partition. At least that's my current guess.
        It boots, but doesn't recognize any of the logins. The processes
        that write to the screen during boot, /etc/rc.local stuff, complains
        about not being root, giving 'Who are you?' messages.
        First question, does this sound familar to anyone, and if so, is it
        fixable? Without rebuilding or restoring?

The fix was to boot the machine single user, copy the (bad) passwd
file to something else, and build a new passwd file with only a root
entry, and no passwd field. Then, reboot and pull a valid file off
of another machine and rebott again. Alls well now.

Second question was:
        Second, we (of course) do system backups, at least occassionally. The
        8mm is on another machine. If I boot the SS1+ off of a CD-ROM, is
        there sufficent networking in place to do an rrestore? What if the
        machines are seperated by a bridge, or worse, a router?

Again, many answers. All but one described how to do it, one thought it
was not posible. Basically, load and boot the miniroot in swap, configure
the network and route tables by hand, and restore (with all the special things
about boot blocks, etc.)

Thanks again to everyone who answered.

jpack@ccpb.navo.navy.mil
vasey@issi.com
montjoy@thor.ece.uc.EDU
Eckhard.Rueggeberg@ts.go.dlr.de
rsr%CSS100@PRI-MU.Prime.COM
richard@hawaii.gmd.de
Anatoly.Lisovsky@kamaz.kazan.su
cmacleod@mcs.dundee.ac.uk

-eric
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L. Eric Greenwade Technical Leader
Visualization and Imaging Team UUCP: ...!uunet!inel.gov!leg
Idaho National Engineering Lab. INTERNET: leg@INEL.GOV
POB 1625 M.S. 2608 Phone: +1-208-526-1276
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