[TAG] Diagnosing a Linux crash

[Thomas Adam]

 --- Tom Brown <tfbrown at ceinetworks.com> wrote: 

> What steps should someone follow after Linux crashes to figure out what 
> went wrong?
> Where do I start, and where do I look for clues?
> Are all the logs found in /var/log, or are there others?
> In what order should I look at the logs, and what should I look for?
> Any pro-active steps I should be taking to get more info, should it 
> happen again?

It depends what you think went wrong. Essentially:

/var/log/messages

is where syslogd will dump all its data and so is the best place to look.
But there may well be application specific data in /var/log
(XFree86.0.log) is one such example.
 
> The specifics of my case: my file server (a 750 Mhz Athlon running Suse 
> 9) simply locked up, and I couldn't get anything to display (GUI or 
> command line). I knew the machine was in trouble, when it didn't respon

This might be framebuffer related. At the lilo/grub prompt, type:

linux video=vga16:off

to see if that has any effect.

There have been snippets of these effects metioned in the past. The one
that springs to mind is:

http://linuxgazette.net/issue74/tag/9.html

-- Thomas Adam

=====
"The Linux Weekend Mechanic" -- http://linuxgazette.net
"TAG Editor"                 -- http://linuxgazette.net

"<shrug> We'll just save up your sins, Thomas, and punish 
you for all of them at once when you get better. The 
experience will probably kill you. :)"

 -- Benjamin A. Okopnik (Linux Gazette Technical Editor)


	
	
		
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