2.1. Create fallback position
Good system administrators always have a viable fallback
plan to cope with failures. A mistake configuring the serial
console can make both the serial console and the attached monitor
and keyboard unusable. A fallback plan is needed to retrieve
console access.
Many Linux
distributions allow boot diskettes to be created. Writing a boot
diskette before altering the console configuration results in a
boot diskette that passes good parameters to the kernel rather than
parameters that may contain an error.
Under Red Hat Linux a boot
diskette is created by determining the running kernel
version
and then using that version to create the boot
diskette
Under Debian
GNU/Linux the boot diskette is
created by determining the version of the running kernel and then
using that version to write the boot diskette
An alternative fallback position is have a rescue diskette
with the machine. A common choice is Tom's root boot.