[uClibc]Strange busybox/uClibc problem

Paul Komarek komarek at andrew.cmu.edu
Tue Jun 25 07:06:44 UTC 2002


The message below was originally (and erroneously) posted by me to the
busybox mailing list.  At the end of the problem report, I mention that
things work fine when I replace uClibc with glib-2.1.3. Also, I'm now on
the uClibc and busybox mailing lists, so there is no need to forward to
me.

On Sat, 22 Jun 2002, Paul Komarek wrote:

>
> I am not (yet) on this mailing list -- the CMU mail admins claim my inbox
> is disturbing gravitational fields due to excessive mass.  Please cc me on
> any responses.
>
> I have a problem when booting a Soekris net4501 (AMD Elan SC520) using
> busybox (compiled against uClibc).  The problem occurs in init.c, but I
> hesitate to claim the problem is in init.c.
>
> The problem is that init stops at strange places:
>
>   VFS: Mounted root (nfs filesystem).
>   Freeing unused kernel memory: 220k freed
>   serial console detected.  Disabling virtual terminals.
>   init started:  BusyBox v0.60.3 (2002.06.22-05:44+0000) multi-call binary
>
> And that's it.  If I comment out init.c:311, then I get further (using
> message( CONSOLE, "Hello, world\n") to track my progress.
>
> init_main() calls check_memory() calls check_free_memory():
>
> static int check_free_memory(void)
> {
>     ...
>     u = info.mem_unit;
>     if (u==0) u=1;                   <------- Line 311, remove
>     ...
> }
>
> If I also comment out init.c:851, I make further progress.
>
> init_main() calls parse_inittab() calls new_init_action():
>
> static void new_init_action(int action, char *command, char *cons)
> {
>     ....
>     if (*cons == '\0')          <----------- Line 851, remove
>         cons = console;
>     ....
> }
>
> When repeating these tests to write this email, I didn't fiddle further
> with my inittab and such.  I did more tests earlier, but never got things
> working right (never got getty to work right, using my own and sample
> configs).
>
> I have this problem whether I do shared or static libs, and for kernels
> 2.4.17, 2.4.19-pre10, and 2.4.19-pre10-ac2 (you can see the desperation
> setting in... ;-).  The problem has occurred when netbooting or booting
> from a CF card.  I'm watching the output from a serial console, but I
> personally don't think that's part of the problem.  I have used a snapshot
> of uClibc from about June 19th, and another from June 22nd.  As you might
> guess, I haven't really taken the cross product of all these options.  If
> you want to know exactly what I've done, I'll be happy to enumerate the
> tests.  Of course, I'd be happy to provide most any information anyone
> things will help (kernel config, etc).
>
> I've made other net4501 boards work with a modified Red Hat 7.2
> distrobution, using a pared-down glibc and custom rh kernel 2.4.17-0.18,
> without any real troubles.
>
> Please let me know if it would be appropriate to post or cross-post to the
> uClibc list.
>
> -Paul Komarek

I found a machine with gcc for i386 installed, and tested busybox with
static linking (and tinylogin with static linking) against glibc-2.1.3.
Everything works as expected (well, I haven't made getty work right for me
yet, but that' probably a PEBKAC situation =-).  I'm going to repost my
above message on the uClibc list now.

-Paul Komarek





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