Enabling a terminal for user logins using Upstart

6.10 LPAR mode z/VM guest KVM guest

If your distribution uses Upstart, you can use an Upstart job file to allow user logins on a terminal.

To enable user logins with Upstart, create an Upstart job file with the following content:

start on runlevel [2345]
stop on runlevel [01]

respawn
exec /sbin/mingetty --noclear <dev>

You can use a file name of your choice. The directory where you must locate the file depends on your distribution.

In the sample file, <dev> specifies the device node of the terminal, omitting the leading /dev/. For example, instead of specifying /dev/sclp_line0, specify sclp_line0.

With mingetty, you must explicitly export the TERM environment variable with the terminal name. The terminal name indicates the capabilities of the terminal device. Examples for terminal names are linux, dumb, xterm, or vt220.

mingetty example:

# export TERM=linux

Instead of mingetty, you can use agetty, which can set the TERM environment variable at startup.

To set the TERM environment variable to linux and enable user logins with Upstart create an Upstart job file with the following content:

start on runlevel [2345]
stop on runlevel [01]

respawn
exec /sbin/agetty -L 9600 <dev> linux

Example

The following Upstart job file enables a device hvc0 for user logins with mingetty.

start on runlevel [2345]
stop on runlevel [01]

respawn
exec /sbin/mingetty --noclear hvc0