Starting an SOL session from the command-line interface

After an SOL session is started, all commands are sent to the operating system on the blade server specified by the console command until the SOL session is ended, regardless of the persistent command target that was in effect before the SOL session. During an SOL session, no BladeCenter® command-line interface commands are valid. If a blade server is restarted while an SOL session is in progress, the SOL session remains in progress while the blade server restarts. Restarting the management module will end all SOL sessions that are running.

The BladeCenter management module automatically stores the previous 8 KB (kilobytes) of serial data that was transmitted by each blade server even when SOL sessions are not active. When an SOL session is established, all of the previous serial data, up to 8 KB, is automatically displayed. If no previous data is available when the SOL session is started, the cursor will remain on the command line until new serial data is transmitted. If a management module fails, all Telnet and SOL sessions are terminated, and their caches are lost, even if failover to a redundant management module is successful.

See the BladeCenter Management Module Command-Line Interface Reference Guide for information about configuring a blade server for SOL using the management module command-line interface. See your operating-system documentation for information about commands that you can enter using an SOL command-line interface.

Note: Serial over LAN (SOL) must be enabled for both the BladeCenter unit and the blade server before you can start an SOL session with the blade server. See General configuration and Special component requirements for information about enabling SOL.

After you start a Telnet or SSH session to the BladeCenter management module (see the BladeCenter Management Module Command-Line Interface Reference Guide), you can start an SOL session to any individual blade server that supports SOL using the console command. Because you can start up to 20 separate Web interface, Telnet, serial (advanced management module only), or SSH sessions to the BladeCenter management module, you can have up to 14 simultaneous SOL sessions with blade servers and 6 command-line interface sessions with other BladeCenter components active at the same time. available for BladeCenter unit management. For a BladeCenter T unit, you can have up to 8 simultaneous SOL sessions with blade servers and 12 command-line interface sessions with other BladeCenter T components active at the same time.

To start an SOL session from the command line, type the following command, indicating the target blade server:

                  console -T system:blade[x]

where x is the blade bay where the blade server assembly is installed. (A blade server that occupies more than one blade bay is identified by the lowest bay number that it occupies.)

For example, to start an SOL connection to the blade server in blade bay 5, type

                  console -T system:blade[5]

Note: If an SOL session displays only a flashing cursor in a blank screen, this indicates an interruption in the flow of serial data. Press Ctrl+q to resume serial data flow.