jeff@cjsa.UUCP (C. Jeffery Small) (12/15/87)
In article <653@astroatc.UUCP>, mag@astroatc.UUCP (Michael A. Goldsmith) writes: > I recently upgraded my 2 year old 7300 from release 3.00 to 3.51. > .... the system now exhibits an annoying behavior: > > After it has been running for a while (amount of time varies), the > system refuses to echo some characters typed on the console. > > The mouse tracks properly, but button presses are often ignored. > The 'ps -ea' command pauses for about 1/2 second part way through its > output. > > There is apparently no observable (at least that I've been able to > determine) correlation between the system beginning this behavior and > any of the following: > > 1. Particular keys typed. > 2. Amount of time system has been up. > 3. What command or commands have been used since system boot. > > The only (temporary) fix for the problem is a reboot. > All of the problems reported above have been and continue to occur on my machine as well. These troubles started when I received a new 3B1 and loaded 3.51 onto it. I have been working with the Hotline for the past three months attempting to isolate the problem which we have been assuming was hardware related. Now I am beginning to believe that there may be a bug in the software. Since I am actively pursuing this problem, I would like to hear from anyone who has experienced any of the following difficulties: 1: The system appears to hang. The mouse tracks across the screen and you can move/resize open windows but there is no response to keyboard input and you can not "select" actions with the mouse nor can you login on another port. 2: The system stops echoing your characters typed at the keyboard but reads the input and executes commands. This may eventually lead to condition No. 1 above. 3: You type commands (like "ps -ea" above or "ls -l") and part of the output appears on the screen and then stops with the WORKING icon displayed. You hit <RTN> and more output is displayed as if the process was hung waiting for keyboard input (probably an I/O interrupt). 4: You "cat", "more" or "less" a file and a few lines appear on the screen and then things hang up as in No. 3 above. As you hit <RTN>, one additional line is displayed only. Each <RTN> will display another single line. No. 3 and 4 also typically progress to condition No. 1 as well. 5: Any other strange repeating occurrence which eventually forces you to reboot the machine in order to clear the problem. If you have experienced any of these conditions, please send me a note describing the following: - Version of the OS you are running - Hardware configuration (Disk size, memory, expansion boards, etc) - Peripherals attached to system - Any special custom software packages you have installed or modifications to the system which you have made - such as: multiple gettys, deamons, elm mail, special uucp hacks, etc. - Description of the problem(s) outlining exactly what occurred, what you or others were doing on the system at the time and what you did to solve the problem. - Description of how often the problem(s) have occurred. - Any other information, hints, ideas or guesses you may have regarding the possible cause of the problem. Armed with your information, we may be able to discover a pattern to these problems which will hopefully lead to a cure. I will pass along all bug reports I receive to the AT&T Hotline and will post followup messages describing any progress which is made. Thanks in advance to all of you who are able to help in this effort. -- Jeffery Small (203) 776-2000 UUCP: uunet!---\ C. Jeffery Small and Associates ihnp4!--- hsi!cjsa!jeff 123 York Street, New Haven, CT 06511 hao!noao!---/