Hi, I'm trying to use the watchdog system (on ubuntu 9.10) so that the PC will reset if there are not updates on /dev/watchdog (as it should be by default I think).

I installed watchdog
apt-get install watchdog

It seems that watchdog is already present on kernel because I found ipmi_watchdog under the modules (/sys/module/ipmi_watchdog)

I loaded the module with modprobe ipmi_watchdog and i didn't have any problem.
Checking with lsmod i found the module loaded.

17 104 0 ipmi_watchdog
ipmi_msghandler 35,256 a ipmi_watchdog

On /etc/watchdog.conf I removed the comment to watchdog-device = /dev/watchdog to control the file/device. In a second test, I also enabled interval = 10 as test.

Finally, I added ipmi_watchdog to /etc/modules so that is loaded at boot.

The problem is that nothing happens.

The file /dev/watchdog is not created by the installation or by the deamon.
I tried to create it (mknod /dev/watchdog c 10 130) but nothing happens.

I also copied and compiled a test program found here:
http://kernel.ubuntu.com/git-repos/r.../Documentation /watchdog /src /

It work correctly ... but if I stop updating the file /dev/watchdog nothing happens.

Finally, I checked /boot/config-2.6.31-20-generic and I found this configuration:

y = CONFIG_CLOCKSOURCE_WATCHDOG
CONFIG_IPMI_WATCHDOG = m
CONFIG_WATCHDOG = y
# CONFIG_WATCHDOG_NOWAYOUT is not set
CONFIG_SOFT_WATCHDOG = y
CONFIG_WM8350_WATCHDOG = m
CONFIG_TWL4030_WATCHDOG = m
# CONFIG_HP_WATCHDOG is not set
CONFIG_SBC_EPX_C3_WATCHDOG = m
CONFIG_PCWATCHDOG = m
CONFIG_PCIPCWATCHDOG = m
CONFIG_USBPCWATCHDOG = m


Can anyone help me?
Thanks