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2.4. Configuration overview
There are four major steps to configuring a serial console.
The boot loader must be configured to use the serial port.
The Linux kernel must be configured to use the serial port as its console. This is done by passing the kernel the console parameter when the kernel is started by the boot loader.
The init system should keep a process running to monitor the serial console for logins. The monitoring process is traditionally called getty.
A number of system utilities need to be configured to make them aware of the console, or configured to prevent them from disrupting the console.
Examples in this HOWTO are from Red Hat Linux versions 7.1 and 7.2, which were released in 2001. The maintainer would appreciate updates for later versions of Red Hat Linux. The maintainer would very much appreciate examples for Linux distributions that are dissimilar to Red Hat Linux; particularly Debian GNU/Linux and Slackware Linux.