SOLVED - new problem with command line characters

cranky

New Member
Mar 16, 2018
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Hello.
I have been running a home server for years that I have just reinstalled. Using the same hardware that I've used with v3.1-21 up to v4.4-1, I have installed a new drive and loaded v5.1-3 for a fresh start. It seems that the install went OK except one problem - the command line now echo's " ^@^@^@... " until the buffer fills and starts a new line. For some reason, I cannot login via the command line. I have tried to login by deleting the extra chars while typing the username, hitting enter in time, and the password is rejected (as if the chars are added into the string in the background). I can get a shell and shell JS from the gui with the same password.

I am concerned that this will ultimately cause infrequent crashes / lockups in the background. As I have been typing this, the line has not reset for the first time and is constantly echoing this string. Will this fill a log, max out something, etc.? I have reconnected the original disks with old images as a check and this problem does not occur again with the last installs!

My experience with linux is lacking, so I have not figured this out yet. Related posts I've found suggested that they had problems with keyboards, etc. In my case, I have not made any changes that I thought would cause this.

Background Info:
US-EN keyboard, CST, ext4, AMD II X6 1035T, 8G, 2 NICs
Tried 3 different (USB + IBM comp) keyboards, two disks, checked ISOs, looked for bios changes, etc.

I will try any advise that I get and mark this post as solved to help others. Please also keep my experience level in mind with any help! Thanks in advance for any guidance!
 
Thanks for the reply.

I have not as clear as I should have. The problem seems to be located ONLY with the command line on the connected monitor. I can type normally on the command line with the correct EN-US key mapping - but the extra characters are inserted into the line as I type. I forgot to mention that I tried EN - UK and Swedish mappings to resolve the problem before posting but that didn't help. I have been able to get a command prompt via the GUI (shell and JS shell) without this problem. The problem disappears if I connect the old disk with the 4.4 image. When installing 5.1, the problem starts to appear after the line about populating the hardware table in the beginning of the install, and extra chars appear on each of the lines when the script pauses for something to complete.

I seems that the problem (my guess) may be with the interrupt polling of the keyboard. About every ~1 second there is some disk activity each time the "keyboard" types something (^@). This started after moving from v4.4 to 5.1. I will try your suggestions and post back if successful. But I cannot understand how this problem could survive reinstall attempts with different keyboards / and different mappings / and trying USB and older PC/2 keyboards with no other HW changes. Could this be a problem with the kernel or upstream?
 
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You could try the newer 4.15 kernel, YMMV

The problem appears to be FIXED! After following the repo change steps in this post (for other noobs like me)...
.../wiki/Package_Repositories#_proxmox_ve_no_subscription_repository
THEN rebooting AND THEN installing "mc" (for me - optionally a quicker way to edit/add usb drives...), we seem to be golden! The tires are gripping the road again!

THANKS for your time!

2 quick questions -
Question #1 - Should the lines in File /etc/apt/sources.list

deb ...Prevented for quoting... tp.debian.org/debian stretch main contrib

and the

# security updates
deb ...Prevented for quoting... security.debian.org stretch/updates main contrib

lines should be added to the newly modified /etc/apt/sources.list as the default configuration has been changed?

Question #2 - Are you aware of any security issues stemming from me installing mc?

Thanks again - I probably will not be the only one to benefit from this!
 
@cranky, that's great news!

Here is what my pve-no-subscription repository looks like using nano -w (edit config file and turn off text wrapping to prevent corruption)

#nano -w /etc/apt/sources.list

deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian stretch main contrib

# NOT recommended for production use
deb http://download.proxmox.com/debian/pve stretch pve-no-subscription

# security updates
deb http://security.debian.org stretch/updates main contrib

#nano -w /etc/apt/sources.list.d

# deb https://enterprise.proxmox.com/debian/pve stretch pve-enterprise

I'm unfamiliar with mc, but definitely start a new thread if you have difficulties.

Regards!
 
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