UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Hi all,

First and foremost I would like to mention I am pretty new to Linux.
I have some experience in Windows systems administration but nothing professionally.
Expect some real newbie questions.

For a small company I am trying to install a server so a development environment can be created.
I am using Debian Stable (5.0.2) to achieve that.
Unfortunately today, at the start of the day, I wanted to log in and the server crashed.
It rebooted and started some procedure which is still running now.
Basically, I want to know what it is doing.

There are lines of text on the screen, it's starts with a decimal number between braces. Where the numbers 228 at the end of the number is consistent.
Followed by what seems to be memory locations with hexadecimal codes. Like this:

[xxxxx.xxx228] EAX: ef023270 EBX: ef023270 ECX: 00000000 EDX: 0000908f

After 4.5 lines of text in this format, it is followed by lines of text with something which looks like filenames in them, in the following format:

[xxxxx.xxx228][<c0165b86>] ? unlink_file_vma+0x1a/0x2d

The last line of text seems a progress bar:
[xxxxx.xxx228] ==================

The screen is frequently refreshing on which the number with which the lines start is updated, it counts up. The rest of the screen does not change. This includes the progress bar which has not made any progress since 7 hours...

I assume that it is checking my system, like a disk check but I would like to know if that is correct.
I would like to know what the numbers at the start of the line start represent.

And my last question, which I understand if it can't be answered is:
Should I be worried that my system needs a re-install or has some hardware defect?

It is hard to tell what is going on for sure from the info you have. Here are a couple hints/starting points.

The Unix equivalent of scandisk is called "fsck". I've run it many times and never seen output like you're getting so I doubt is is a disk check. You could google that to familiarize yourself with it so you can be sure.

Based on all the hex addresses you're getting I would guess you're getting a panic - analagous to the "blue screen of death" from Windows. This is often caused by a software problem (writing to restricted memory, illegal instruction, etc.) but can also be caused by hardware errors. If this is a server with a service processor of some kind try to access that and see if it logged any hardware faults or messages. If it's just a PC obviously that won't work.

You probably need to reboot or power cycle in either case. Carefully watch the messages and see if you can find a clue there.

Good luck.