The kdump-tools package provides init scripts and configuration files to use kdump. It is as automated as can be at this point, but some manual configuration may still be required. Specifically: 1. Kernel Configuration You must boot a kernel that was configured with: CONFIG_KEXEC=y CONFIG_CRASH_DUMP=y For ia64, you also need: CONFIG_SPARSEMEM=y For the resulting dump to be useful, you probably also want: CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO=y If you use CONFIG_DISCONTIG, then you can only use makedumpfile level 1 (omit zero pages). 2. Kdump Kernel You must have a kdump kernel, which is either relocatable or built to start at a non-default address (which you must also set in the kernel command-line parameter, see below). Linux on ia64 is always relocatable; recent x86, x86_64, and powerpc kernels have an option for this: CONFIG_RELOCATABLE=y If your architecture does not support this option, you must build it with a non-default CONFIG_PHYSICAL_START option. If your boot kernel is relocatable, kdump-config will use it as the kdump kernel. Otherwise, you will have to provide one. Once you have a relocatable crash kernel, set KDUMP_KERNEL and if necessary KDUMP_INITRD in the /etc/default/kdump-tools file. The kdump kernel needs to be configured with: CONFIG_CRASH_DUMP=y 3. Kernel Command line parameter You must boot your kernel with a 'crashkernel=' command line parameter, for example: crashkernel=128M That will reserve 128 MB of memory for the kdump kernel to use in case of a crash. See Documentation/kdump/kdump.txt in the Linux source for more advanced crashkernel parameter syntax. You may also want to add 'nmi_watchdog=1' on certain systems. 4. Local Configuration The /etc/default/kdump-tools file can be modified to reflect your setup, if automatic detection fails, or if you need specific architectural settings. 5. Architectural considerations A) x86 && PAE && memory > 4 Gigabytes will need to use KDUMP_KEXEC_ARGS="--elf64-core-headers" B) x86 and x86_64 Some systems can take advantage of the nmi watchdog. Add nmi_watchdog=1 to the boot commandline to turn on the watchdog. The nmi interrupt will call panic if activated. C) ia64 some systems may need KDUMP_KEXEC_ARGS="--noio". Use this if the system hangs after a panic, but before the kdump kernel begins to boot.