Unable to get YAST to Load (Also can't change the time) - SUSE 10.3

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#1

Hi All,
I have just recently found I have a problem under SUSE 10.3.

History, I had my PC, an IBM Power Centre box with 4g ram and 2 hard-drives (80gb and 1Tb) fail to reboot after a power drop. Got an error message about the 80gb H/D losing some information. I was able tofix the issues by using “fsck”.

The PC was able to restart after this, and seemed to be working well.

However in the last couple of days I noiticed that the time was incorrect, it seems the sync for time has switched to normal time too early.
Right mouse click to adjust this would not bring up the “adjust time” window. ?Why, unknown.

I then decided I would go through “YAST” to do my changes, but now I am unable to load “YAST”. I can load it through a terminal window, but there must be some reason why it won’t load the GUI? from the menu.?

There could be other programs that are also not loading that I have not found.

Q- could something have been lost when I had the H/D reboot issue? And if so is there any way of restoring lost or coruputed OS files?

I have the 10.3 OS on DVD, which is how I installed it, and note that there is a recovey prompt, but need some advise on how to go about it.
A total reinstall is not an option at this time until I can get a backup unit running.

Any advise would be gratefully received, hopefully you can save my day.

Regards Kevin.

If I have miised any information critical to a reply please do ask for me to include it.

#2

On 03/22/2011 07:36 PM, sparcnz wrote:
>
> I have just recently found I have a problem under SUSE 10.3.

as openSUSE 10.3 reached its end of life about a year and a half ago
so i assume you are running SUSE Linux Enterprise version 10 SP 3, and
if so you are welcome to seek advice here, but BE ADVISED that many of
the answers might be from folks who have never run SLES (or maybe
never even heard of it before) and you are likely much better off if
you seek assistance from the Novell forums, via: http://forums.novell.com/

you can learn exactly what version you are running by running in a
terminal:


cat /etc/SuSE-release

>
> Right mouse click to adjust this would not bring up the “adjust time”
> window. ?Why, unknown.

maybe some of the information that error message said you were using
was responsible for adjusting time…

> I then decided I would go through “YAST” to do my changes, but now I am
> unable to load “YAST”. I can load it through a terminal window, but
> there must be some reason why it won’t load the GUI? from the menu.?

more lost bits on your hard drive maybe…

> Q- could something have been lost when I had the H/D reboot issue?

ahhhhh…you said you saw a error message saying that…so, the answer
must be yes…

what you “fixed with fsck” didn’t reintroduce lost bits…
but, it may have placed remaining partial file fragments found around
on your damaged drive in a lost+found directory, but i’ve met anyone
who was able to rebuild all damaged files, because invariability there
is missing data…

> And
> if so is there any way of restoring lost or coruputed OS files?

maybe…but, would you want to continue with a system so long without
security updates?

>
> I have the 10.3 OS on DVD, which is how I installed it, and note that
> there is a recovey prompt, but need some advise on how to go about it.

i believe the recovery prompt depends on being able to connect to the
10.3 repos to fetch needed code…and, as those were taken down over
a year ago i think you are pretty much stuck with what you have…

and, a reinstall from the DVD may not be advisable since that is VERY
old and unpatched code…you wouldn’t want to use that, i don’t think…

> Any advise would be gratefully received, hopefully you can save my
> day.

i hope you are running SLE_10 and have a support agreement with
Novell…if so, you need t ask them what to do, and in what
order…AND, they have the supporting repos you will need to rebuild
your system…

free advice: as soon as you can, boot from a good CD/DVD and backup
all data to off machine media (i say boot from a CD/DVD because it is
NOT certain that the damaged system you have on the hard drive is
capable of delivering a 100% correct copy of your data to . . . )

good luck

–
DenverD
CAVEAT: http://is.gd/bpoMD
[NNTP posted w/openSUSE 11.3, KDE4.5.5, Thunderbird3.1.8, nVidia
173.14.28 3D, Athlon 64 3000+]
“It is far easier to read, understand and follow the instructions than
to undo the problems caused by not.” DD 23 Jan 11

#3

HI DenverD,

Thanks for your reply, and for your providedhelp and responces. I think I need to include some xtra information to answer your questions.
I am afriad I am using OpenSUSE 10.3, as being a Not-for-Profit Community Radio Station resources are very limited.
And also because 10.3 was the recommended OS for the Linux program I am running, in this case “Rivendell Automated Radio Software”

I believe the problem came about because of a faulty 80Gb H/D which I used to get the PC going. The donated PC only had a 40Gb. The 2nd H/D is a 1Tb and used to store all the music carts. Don’t want to mix the contents like in this case where I could lose the collection. I do have a back-up. A new H/D will be installed.

They are bringing out a newer version that will run on the lastest distros, but I need to keep this one going until the final RC is available. In which case I will be installing the lastest OpenSUSE version.

Again thanks for your assistance

Kevin.

#4

On 03/23/2011 01:06 AM, sparcnz wrote:
>
> I need to keep this one going until the final RC is
> available.

i kinda fear anything i might write could cause you to go off the air,
so i ask to read the caveat in my sig before you do anything
else…AND get other opinions on what you might want to do…

first: due to the fact that some stuff doesn’t work after the power
fail/fsck, i still think you have a damaged operating system

second: but some stuff still works ok (i guess you are still on the
air, right?)

third: i don’t know how long it is until the new RC is out, nor do i
know how long your system might continue working good enough to get
you on the air…so:

i’m gonna recommend a modified “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”
approach…by that i mean: you can’t start YaST but you don’t really
have to because, except for the time and/or timezone change date being
wrong every thing else is working – Right?

so, lets leave the idea of rebuilding a full up, everything is
wonderful system (which is probably not possible anyway without active
10.3 repos or Herculean effort) and just get right time in your
system…ok?

hmmmmmmmm…now i’ve had a cup of tea and a long pause and see i
don’t how to adjust either the clock or time zone from the command
line without a LOT more reading than i have patience for this
instant…i think it is easy to set, but that doesn’t pop out at me
yet…

i will come back to this problem as soon as i can…in the mean time
lets both hope a real time setting guru drops in…

by the way: does this (what?) one hour wrong time impact
greatly…what happens if what you have doesn’t change until Sunday,
when maybe your system decides THIS is the day to change time??

bottom line: i do not recommend you try to solve this problem using
the DVD’s recovery/repair options as i think they might very likely
make the system worse than it is (but, maybe another has a different
idea–read MY caveat, again)

–
DenverD
CAVEAT: http://is.gd/bpoMD
[NNTP posted w/openSUSE 11.3, KDE4.5.5, Thunderbird3.1.8, nVidia
173.14.28 3D, Athlon 64 3000+]
“It is far easier to read, understand and follow the instructions than
to undo the problems caused by not.” DD 23 Jan 11

#5

on 03/23/2011 11:15 AM, DenverD wrote:
> by the way: does this (what?) one hour wrong time impact
> greatly…what happens if what you have doesn’t change until Sunday,
> when maybe your system decides THIS is the day to change time??
>

wait, i wasn’t thinking…

can you access yast this way:

open a terminal
type in and enter


su -

don’t overlook the space and - following the u

then enter


yast

and do you then see a “old-style” yast?
read my caveat and exit yast if you wish:

can you Tab around to fine the clock setting section there?

this way, maybe:
down arrow to “System” (on left)
then right arrow to “Date and Time” then hit enter

i recommend you leave everything alone except to set the time, so
Tab Tab Tab Tab to “Change…” and hit enter
then Tab to “Manually” and hit enter
set the current time HOURS
then Tab to “Change time now” and hit enter
then tab until you get to “Accept” and hit enter
then tab to “OK” and hit enter
and then finally to “Quit” and hit enter…

then type in exit and enter to close the terminal…

–
DenverD
CAVEAT: http://is.gd/bpoMD
[NNTP posted w/openSUSE 11.3, KDE4.5.5, Thunderbird3.1.8, nVidia
173.14.28 3D, Athlon 64 3000+]
“It is far easier to read, understand and follow the instructions than
to undo the problems caused by not.” DD 23 Jan 11

#6

On 2011-03-22 19:36, sparcnz wrote:
>
> Hi All,
> I have just recently found I have a problem under SUSE 10.3.
>

I have seen your second post and I understand that you are stuck for the
moment with that old version.

You need to configure the repositories to a mirror that still keeps your
“discontinued” version.

http://en.opensuse.org/openSUSE:Mirrors#EOL_Mirrors

> The PC was able to restart after this, and seemed to be working well.
>
> However in the last couple of days I noiticed that the time was
> incorrect, it seems the sync for time has switched to normal time too
> early.

There has been several updates to the summer/winter time for several
countries, which you haven’t got for your old version. Might be that. If
that is the cause, you will just have to accept it that way, or switch to UTC.

I understood your computer is old, so you should also check the CMOS battery.

> Right mouse click to adjust this would not bring up the “adjust time”
> window. ?Why, unknown.

You can’t, unless you are root.

> I then decided I would go through “YAST” to do my changes, but now I am
> unable to load “YAST”. I can load it through a terminal window, but
> there must be some reason why it won’t load the GUI? from the menu.?

Dunno.

> There could be other programs that are also not loading that I have not
> found.
>
> Q- could something have been lost when I had the H/D reboot issue? And
> if so is there any way of restoring lost or coruputed OS files?

rpm verify. I think it is rpm -qa --verify.

>
> I have the 10.3 OS on DVD, which is how I installed it, and note that
> there is a recovey prompt, but need some advise on how to go about it.

I was never successful using the automatic recovery.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” at Telcontar)

#7

On 2011-03-23 11:15, DenverD wrote:
> by the way: does this (what?) one hour wrong time impact greatly…what
> happens if what you have doesn’t change until Sunday, when maybe your
> system decides THIS is the day to change time??

If the problem is that the system is not changing time from winter to
summer at the appropriate date, there is nothing you can do.

Of course it is possible to do something, like getting the current,
updated, sources for timezone, recompile for 10.3, and install. It is not
something I ever did, so I can’t help.

The alternative is using not local time, ie, UTC, or setting one of the
static timezones, like UTC+2.

–
Cheers / Saludos,

Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” at Telcontar)

#8

Recommend:

  1. Make a full backup, pronto. Now. Do not delay. If you’re running in a business you should be making regular backups anyway.
  2. Spend $40 on a decent but inexpensive Backup Power Supply, preferably one that will support brownouts (cheap ones usually don’t but still try).
  3. As noted, if the machine is over 3 yrs old change the CMOS battery (it should cost about $3 somewhere)
  4. Get yourself another hard drive, it can be a small one that costs no more than $50. Or, find someone who can give you a used dirve if it’s reliable
  5. Install new. You say you have the original disks and Carlos posted the current online repositories for that openSUSE release.

As for your current machine.

  • Sounds like you already discovered how to launch and run YAST in a terminal, that should be sufficient for now. If you want to try repairing YAST, just do the usual re-installation of the YAST packages (you only need the DVD for that), maybe also re-install the listed dependencies.
  • I’m not clear exactly how your time is mis-configured, but if you’re connected to the Internet you shouldn’t be manually changing your time. Configure NTP so that every time your machine boots up, it will sync with a Timeserver on the Internet. If you need to do a manual sync, typically you can do that by simply clicking a button in YAST. If you’re not able to do any of that and can’t find the commands to do any/all of this from the CLI, then post again for help (The commands aren’t that strange).
  • Run a S.M.A.R.T analysis. All hard drives for the past 10 years or so (and many long before then) support S.M.A.R.T Doing an analysis will tell you if the disk is in good shape or on its last legs. If it’s in good shape then you should feel relatively confident about repairing your existing install. If your disk is going, you need to go into emergency mode to protect your applications and data.

HTH,
Tony