Forcing a Crash Dump and Reboot of the System

The following procedures are provided in this section:

SPARC: How to Force a Crash Dump and Reboot of the System
x86: How to Force a Crash Dump and Reboot of the System

Forcing a crash dump and reboot of the system are sometimes necessary for troubleshooting purposes. The savecore feature is enabled by default.

For more information about system crash dumps, see Managing System Crash Dump Information in Troubleshooting Typical Issues in Oracle Solaris 11.1.

SPARC: How to Force a Crash Dump and Reboot of the System

Use this procedure to force a crash dump of a SPARC based system. The example that follows this procedure shows how to use the halt -d command to force a crash dump of the system. You will need to manually reboot the system after running this command.

Bring the system to the ok PROM prompt.
Synchronize the file systems and write the crash dump.
```
> n
ok sync
```
After the crash dump is written to disk, the system will continue to reboot.
Verify that the system boots to run level 3.
The login prompt is displayed when the boot process has finished successfully.
```
hostname console login:
```

Example 6-3 SPARC: Forcing a Crash Dump and Reboot of a System by Using the halt -d Command

This example shows how to force a crash dump and reboot of a SPARC based system by using the halt -d command.

# halt -d
Jul 21 14:13:37 jupiter halt: halted by root

panic[cpu0]/thread=30001193b20: forced crash dump initiated at user request

000002a1008f7860 genunix:kadmin+438 (b4, 0, 0, 0, 5, 0)
  %l0-3: 0000000000000000 0000000000000000 0000000000000004 0000000000000004
  %l4-7: 00000000000003cc 0000000000000010 0000000000000004 0000000000000004
000002a1008f7920 genunix:uadmin+110 (5, 0, 0, 6d7000, ff00, 4)
  %l0-3: 0000030002216938 0000000000000000 0000000000000001 0000004237922872
  %l4-7: 000000423791e770 0000000000004102 0000030000449308 0000000000000005

syncing file systems... 1 1 done
dumping to /dev/dsk/c0t0d0s1, offset 107413504, content: kernel
100% done: 5339 pages dumped, compression ratio 2.68, dump succeeded
Program terminated
ok boot
Resetting ... 

.
.
Rebooting with command: boot
Boot device: /pci@1f,0/pci@1,1/ide@3/disk@0,0:a
File and args: kernel/sparcv9/unix
configuring IPv4 interfaces: hme0.
add net default: gateway 172.20.27.248
Hostname: jupiter
The system is coming up.  Please wait.
NIS domain name is example.com
.
.
.
System dump time: Wed Jul 21 14:13:41 2010
Jul 21 14:15:23 jupiter savecore: saving system crash dump
in /var/crash/jupiter/*.0
Constructing namelist /var/crash/jupiter/unix.0
Constructing corefile /var/crash/jupiter/vmcore.0
100% done: 5339 of 5339 pages saved
.
.
.

x86: How to Force a Crash Dump and Reboot of the System

If you cannot use the reboot -d or the halt -d command, you can use the kernel debugger (kmdb) to force a crash dump. The kernel debugger must have been loaded, either at boot time or with the mdb -k command for the following procedure to work.

Note - You must be in text mode to access the kernel debugger. So, first exit any window system.

Access the kernel debugger.
The method that is used to access the debugger is dependent upon the type of console that you are using to access the system.
- If you are using a locally attached keyboard, press F1–A.
- If you are using a serial console, send a break by using the method appropriate to that type of serial console.
The kmdb prompt is displayed.
To force a crash, use the systemdump macro.
```
[0]> $<systemdump
```
Panic messages are displayed, the crash dump is saved, and the system reboots.
Verify that the system has rebooted by logging in at the console login prompt.

Example 6-4 x86: Forcing a Crash Dump and Reboot of the System by Using the halt -d Command

This example shows how to force a crash dump and reboot of an x86 based system by using the halt -d command.

# halt -d
4ay 30 15:35:15 wacked.<domain>.COM halt: halted by user

panic[cpu0]/thread=ffffffff83246ec0: forced crash dump initiated at user request

fffffe80006bbd60 genunix:kadmin+4c1 ()
fffffe80006bbec0 genunix:uadmin+93 ()
fffffe80006bbf10 unix:sys_syscall32+101 ()

syncing file systems... done
dumping to /dev/dsk/c1t0d0s1, offset 107675648, content: kernel
NOTICE: adpu320: bus reset
100% done: 38438 pages dumped, compression ratio 4.29, dump succeeded

Welcome to kmdb
Loaded modules: [ audiosup crypto ufs unix krtld s1394 sppp nca uhci lofs 
genunix ip usba specfs nfs md random sctp ]
[0]> 
kmdb: Do you really want to reboot? (y/n) y

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