0 - halt (Do NOT set initdefault to this) 1 - Single user mode 2 - Multiuser, without NFS (The same as 3, if you do not have networking) 3 - Full multiuser mode 4 - unused 5 - X11 6 - reboot (Do NOT set initdefault to this)
The runlevels used by RHS are:
0 - halt (Do NOT set initdefault to this) 1 - Single user mode 2 - Multiuser, without NFS (The same as 3, if you do not have networking) 3 - Full multiuser mode 4 - unused 5 - X11 6 - reboot (Do NOT set initdefault to this)
Runlevel 0,6 is halt and reboot, 1 is maintenance mode.
Runlevel 2&3: getty on console, level 3 also getty on modem port.
Runlevels S and s are in fact the same. Internally they are aliases for the same runlevel.
Runlevels 7-9 are also valid, though not really documented and used.
A runlevel is a software configuration of the system which allows only a selected group of processes to exist. The processes spawned by init for each of these runlevels are defined in the /etc/inittab file. Init can be in one of eight runlevels: 0-6 and S or s.
The runlevel is changed by having a privileged user run init or telinit, which sends appropriate signals to init, telling it which runlevel to change to.
Runlevels 0, 1, and 6 are reserved. Runlevel 0 is used to halt the system, runlevel 6 is used to reboot the system, and runlevel 1 is used to get the system down into single user mode. Runlevel S is not really meant to be used directly, but more for the scripts that are executed when entering runlevel 1.
# runlevel N 5
set `/sbin/runlevel` runlevel=$2 previous=$1