C_INIT Actor

In the extended environment, a special actor called C_INIT provides administrative commands for the following:

• network configuration, such as defining IP addresses and initializing network interfaces

• file system management, such as partitioning a disk and mounting a file system

• device management, such as binding a high level service (file system, networking, tty management) to an actual device driver

Here are the most frequently used C_INIT commands:

• mknod: defines special device files

• mkdev: binds high level services to an instance of a device driver

• mount, umount: mounts and unmounts file systems

• arun: launches executables

• ifconfig: defines IP addresses

• route, rarp, netstat, ppp, ping: miscellaneous networking commands

• memstat, chorusStat: prints system statistics

• setenv, unsetenv, echo, help, sleep, reboot, shutdown: miscellaneous system commands

• rshd, console, source: specifies the device from which commands can be accepted:

  • rshd: from a host through rsh

  • console: from system console

  • source: from a file

See C_INIT(1M) for a complete description.

These commands are invoked at system start-up, described in the following section, and later during the life of the system. During the life of the system, the C_INIT actor executes commands from the system console, or from a remote host through rsh.