Fix for system BOOT date&time, all SysV systems

[Thad P Floryan]

In <4392 at cuuxb.ATT.COM> fmcgee at cuuxb.ATT.COM (Frank McGee) writes:

	Don't know about your systems, but on our systems here (running 386 Unix
	Sys V Rel 3.2.1 and 3.2.2) who -r shows the correct boot time.

	Both have inittabs dating back to 1989, and both show a boot date of
	Jan 2, with the correct times.

	Maybe you're referring to Unix PC Unix ?

And in <2411 at ttardis.UUCP> rlw at ttardis.UUCP (Ron Wilson) writes:

	On my UNIX-PC (system software rel 3.51), the boot time displayed by
	who is derived from the interrupt driven software clock. 

	After powering up the machine, the software clock is set to whatever
	time it (would have) reported just before shutdown followed by power
	down. 

	If I simply reboot (without powering down and back up), It only looses
	about 20 or 30 seconds. 

All in reference to my:

	In the absence of the following "fixes", it "appears" the boot
	date&time is derived from the last update date&time on /etc/inittab,
	even if one's /etc/rc script has command(s) to set the present
	date&time.

I'll bet if Frank looks at the /etc/inittab on his system, he'll find at
least one "sysinit" entry.  I finally was able to find a 3B2 system and
looked at its inittab and DID find a "sysinit" entry for, guess what,
setting the clock; that system was running SysV3.2.  The stock UNIXPC's
inittab does NOT have any "sysinit" entries which prompted my original
posting illustrating what one could do to fix the problem on one's own
system(s). 

Since my "fixes", MY system (3B1, release 3.51a) now has the -=<PRECISE>=-
boot time and the precise time of entering runlevel 2.  Gee, it's really a
thrill reading all the sysadmin docs; everything is sooooooo clear!  :-) :-)

Re: Ron's comments, I did some more checking and it still "appears" that
during the shutdown procedure the /etc/inittab somehow gets "diddled" again
and THAT modification date&time on THAT file is the one that the system uses
on bootup in the ABSENCE of a "sysinit" entry in /etc/inittab.  Whew!

For those not aware, the /etc/inittab on the UNIXPC gets altered (normally
just replacing a ":" at line beginnings with a " " or vice versa) every time
one alters various system communication parameters via /usr/bin/phtoggle or
the UA's RS-232 setup menus, contrasted with a standard SysV system's inittab
being altered (normally) only during a system (re-)build or (re-)configure.

Sigh.  I have over 15 linear feet of RECENT (SysVR3.2 and 3.2.2 docs), and
none of this stuff is "obvious".  What's REALLY needed for AT&T docs is yet
another manual, but this one would be a key-word cross reference to ALL the
other docs, accompanied by a permuted index (via ptx) of ALL the stuff from
ALL the man pages.   Seriously.   I'd buy such a book(s).

Hey, don't think I'm griping SOLELY about UNIX docs, you should hear my
comments about DEC's VMS documentation ... the ears of people at my office
turn red many times a day!  At least we're not discussing modem manuals; that
is yet another issue.  :-)

Thad Floryan [ thad at cup.portal.com (OR) ..!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!thad ]