HOWTO_create_a_run_level

It has been suggested that this article be Merged into one article with Runlevel.    (Discuss)

Introduction

This Howto will explain how you can make additional runlevels. Runlevels can be very handy if you (for example) want to make seperate runlevels for a graphical, and text-mode boot.

Creating the Run Level

Creating a new run level is as simple as creating a new directory in /etc/runlevels/. For example, to create a new runlevel "example":

cd /etc/runlevels
mkdir <new-runlevel-name>

To add services to this new runlevel, you can use rc-update, for example, to add service "example_service" to runlevel "example"

rc-update add example_service example

Creating runlevel console

You could also create runlevel based on another runlevel. In this example we will create old init3 runlevel without graphical login.

cp -R /etc/runlevels/default /etc/runlevels/console
rm /etc/runlevels/console/xdm

Using the new run level

At boot time

To specify a runlevel other than the default upon boot, append softlevel=your_runlevel_name to your kernel's options.

Example grub.conf

title=Gentoo Linux - New Runlevel
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/bzImage-2.6.8-r7 root=/dev/hda3 softlevel=new-runlevel

After boot

To switch to runlevel "example":

rc example

To return to default runlevel:

rc default

Resources

Initscripts: Changing the Runlevel Behaviour