In message <20030208020926.22fa2044.christianbiere@gmx.de>, Christian Biere wri
tes:
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>"Steven M. Bellovin" <smb@research.att.com> wrote:
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>> In message <20030208003932.5eb24ce1.christianbiere@gmx.de>, Christian
>> Biere writes:
>> >could you provide a backtrace of a crash?
>
>> I wish I could, but I don't know how to get one.  The machine locks up
>> hard, and the only way I know to reset it -- this is a laptop -- is to
>> lean on the power button for several seconds.  ctl+alt+esc doesn't
>> work at that point, as best I can tell, though since I'm in X I'm not
>> 100% certain.
>
>Try putting ddb.onpanic=0 into your /etc/sysctl.conf. In case of kernel
>panic the memory should be dumped and a backtrace should be written to
>the kernel mesg buffer. You should find this message in
>/var/log/messages or read it with dmesg after rebooting.
><CTRL>+<ALT>+<ESC> seems to be futile while your running X (at least on
>i386) - sometimes the keyboard is still useable but often it's not and
>then you cannot even sync the disks making the panic even worse.

I've had that setting for a long time.  It's not panicking; it's 
hanging.


		--Steve Bellovin, http://www.research.att.com/~smb (me)
		http://www.wilyhacker.com (2nd edition of "Firewalls" book)