System will not reboot

[lorel]

OS: SCO UNIX 5.0.7
Server HP Proliant ML 310 with SCSI drives

Problem: System needs to be rebooted daily, (It is required by the application running in the server).
We accomplish this with the following command in crontab:
0 4 * * 1-5 /etc/shutdown -y -g0 -i6
In this server, the server will go down until it reaches the message "System is down", then it will seat there, pressing the ENTER key has no effect. The only way to reboot system is by turning it off then on again.

The AUTOBOOT parameter in /etc/default/boot is set to YES.
Was not able to find anything in the BIOS that may prevent server form rebooting.

WE have other systems with the same setup and they all reboot fine with the shutdown command.

Any ideas?

Thanks

Joe

 

[M577A2]

Booting Unix daily? That's just wrong...

The syntax is definitely correct. Try

0 4 * * 1-5 /etc/reboot

if it does the same thing then it's probably something in the server BIOS that is preventing it from coming back up.

 

[lorel]

We need to reboot every day because our application uses a lot of pointers, and we have found out the rebooting the system makes our application run a lot faster since rebooting clears the pointers.

I have tried /etc/reboot. System hangs on 2 processes that refuses to die. I am going back to the client site to check what those 2 processes are and to see if they can be prevented from running in the first place.

I have checked all the options in the BIOS and I have been unable to find anything that would prevent the rebooting of the system.

/etc/reboot is basically a haltsys command (see man reboot). It is a hard shutdown, almost as bad as pulling the plug on the system. Since we do not know if there are any files open at the time of the shutdown, we can not use the reboot command. /etc/shutdown closes any files that are open and stops all processes in a graceful manner, while reboot does not do.

This may be a possible problem of the type of server we are using: HP Proliant HL 310, I just receive a report were we apparently have another client with the same problem, and they also have a HP Proliant HL310.


Thanks for taking the time to answer

Joe

 

[edfair]

In 5.0.5 I use /etc/init 6 to force a reboot to clean out stuff left hanging by an application. Don't know if that will help you.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.