What is the correct way to get a serial console working on Debian Jessie? I appear to have hosed grub whilst trying to add various kernel boot parameters that googling has turned up.

Thanks.

not sure what you mean by "serial console", but if you want to edit the grub command line, i think pressing 'e' or 'Tab' in grub menu should take you there.

otherwise, we will need much more information about what the problem actually is.

Have you tried these guides? Debian 8 uses systemd by default so anything that references inittab will not work.

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php...serial_console
https://onemoretech.wordpress.com/20...-on-fedora-20/

By configuring a serial console one can use another PC via a terminal emulator like minicom or Hyperterminal to log in to a linux computer via a serial port (RS-232). In addition the boot up messages are sent over the serial port versus tty0 like you would normally see when linux starts.

Mainframes of yesterday were accessed by terminals i.e. physical devices like a DEC VT-100 using RS-232.

Although no longer current gives you a basic idea of how it works.
http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Remote-Ser...WTO/index.html

Thanks Michaelk. In the end I used:

This starts a getty on the specified serial port as a service that runs at every boot. It was at a baud rate of 9600 on my system, not the 38400 stated in the Arch Wiki article.

Great that you got it working.

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