16.2. Using installation log files

Procedure

1. Select the Install Red Hat Enterprise Linux option from the boot menu.
2. Press the Tab key on BIOS-based systems or the e key on UEFI-based systems to edit the selected boot options.

3. Append inst.debug to the options. For example:

   vmlinuz ... inst.debug

4. Press the Enter key on your keyboard. The system stores the pre-installation log files in the /tmp/pre-anaconda-logs/ directory before the installation program starts.
5. Press Ctrl + Alt + F2 to switch to the console and access the log files.

6. Change to the /tmp/pre-anaconda-logs/ directory:

   # cd /tmp/pre-anaconda-logs/

Procedure

1. Press Ctrl + Alt + F2 to access a shell prompt on the system you are installing.

2. Connect a USB flash drive to the system and run the dmesg command:

   # dmesg

   A log detailing all recent events is displayed. At the end of this log, a set of messages is displayed. For example:

   [ 170.171135] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI removable disk

3. Note the name of the connected device. In the above example, it is sdb.

4. Navigate to the /mnt directory and create a new directory that serves as the mount target for the USB drive. This example uses the name usb:

   # mkdir usb

5. Mount the USB flash drive onto the newly created directory. In most cases, you do not want to mount the whole drive, but a partition on it. Do not use the name sdb, use the name of the partition you want to write the log files to. In this example, the name sdb1 is used:

   # mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt/usb

6. Verify that you mounted the correct device and partition by accessing it and listing its contents:

   # cd /mnt/usb

   # ls

7. Copy the log files to the mounted device.

   # cp /tmp/*log /mnt/usb

8. Unmount the USB flash drive. If you receive an error message that the target is busy, change your working directory to outside the mount (for example, /).

   # umount /mnt/usb

Procedure

1. Press Ctrl + Alt + F2 to access a shell prompt on the system you are installing.

2. Switch to the /tmp directory where the log files are located:

   # cd /tmp

3. Copy the log files onto another system on the network using the scp command:

   # scp *log user@address:path

   1. Replace user with a valid user name on the target system, address with the target system’s address or host name, and path with the path to the directory where you want to save the log files. For example, if you want to log in as john on a system with an IP address of 192.168.0.122 and place the log files into the /home/john/logs/ directory on that system, the command is as follows:

      # scp *log john@192.168.0.122:/home/john/logs/

      When connecting to the target system for the first time, the SSH client asks you to confirm that the fingerprint of the remote system is correct and that you want to continue:

      The authenticity of host '192.168.0.122 (192.168.0.122)' can't be established.
      ECDSA key fingerprint is a4:60:76:eb:b2:d0:aa:23:af:3d:59:5c:de:bb:c4:42.
      Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)?

   2. Type yes and press Enter to continue. Provide a valid password when prompted. The files are transferred to the specified directory on the target system.