[CentOS] How to use watchdog daemon with hardware watchdog driver interface?

Steve Clark sclark at netwolves.com
Wed Sep 18 10:32:20 UTC 2013


On 09/18/2013 03:57 AM, Alexander Farber wrote:
> Good morning!
>
> On a CentOS 6.4 / 64 bit server I have
> installed the watchdog 5.5 package.
>
> The rpm -qi watchdog states:
>
> The watchdog program can be used as a powerful software watchdog
> daemon or may be alternately used with a hardware watchdog device such
> as the IPMI hardware watchdog driver interface to a resident Baseboard
> Management Controller (BMC).
> ...
> This configuration file is also used to set the watchdog to be used as
> a hardware watchdog instead of its default software watchdog
> operation.
>
> In the dmesg output of my server
> ( full text at http://pastebin.com/GbF7dRt7 )
> I see such a device:
>
> NMI watchdog enabled, takes one hw-pmu counter.
> ...
> ipmi message handler version 39.2
> IPMI System Interface driver.
> ipmi_si: Adding default-specified kcs state machine
> ipmi_si: Trying default-specified kcs state machine at i/o address
> 0xca2, slave address 0x0, irq 0
> ipmi_si: Interface detection failed
> ipmi_si: Adding default-specified smic state machine
> ipmi_si: Trying default-specified smic state machine at i/o address
> 0xca9, slave address 0x0, irq 0
> ipmi_si: Interface detection failed
> ipmi_si: Adding default-specified bt state machine
> ipmi_si: Trying default-specified bt state machine at i/o address
> 0xe4, slave address 0x0, irq 0
> ipmi_si: Interface detection failed
> ipmi_si: Unable to find any System Interface(s)
> ...
> iTCO_vendor_support: vendor-support=0
> iTCO_wdt: Intel TCO WatchDog Timer Driver v1.07rh
> iTCO_wdt: Found a Lynx Point TCO device (Version=2, TCOBASE=0x1860)
> iTCO_wdt: initialized. heartbeat=30 sec (nowayout=0)
>
> My question is: what should I put into
> /etc/watchdog.conf to enable the
> hardware watchdog instead of the
> default software watchdog mode?
>
> I've also asked this question at
> http://serverfault.com/questions/539816/how-to-use-watchdog-daemon-with-hardware-watchdog-driver-interface
>
> Thank you
> Alex
Hi  Alex,

Look to see if you have a /dev/watchdog device. If you do basically all you need to do is then
service watchdog start. To test if it is working get the pid of the watchdog process and do a kill
-9.  If your box reboots then the hardware watchdog works.

There are some additional features you can have the watchdog program check, see the man page.

Hope this helps,
Steve

-- 
Stephen Clark
*NetWolves*
Director of Technology
Phone: 813-579-3200
Fax: 813-882-0209
Email: steve.clark at netwolves.com
http://www.netwolves.com



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