Upstart is the new init in Ubuntu Lucid, and there are a mix of upstart and System V init scripts installed.

Following the previous steps on enabling the text console and disabling plymouth yields an almost normal text console for Lucid server. However most init script output is missing. Switching to tty7 one sees only some init script output. By default upstart output goes to /dev/null.

Upon reading the upstart docs one comes away with the thought of adding "console output" to all of the upstart scripts.

  console output
  env INIT_VERBOSE

That is a PITA, and will break on package upgrades. Further, one would need to add their own console messages in various sections of the upstart script in question:

  exec echo "Starting openssh"

Hardly as nice as the messages provided by the old SysV system, via:

  . /lib/lsb/init-functions

The temporary solution we found, is to set kernel command line options in /boot/grub/menu.lst:

  # defoptions=nosplash INIT_VERBOSE=yes init=/sbin/init -v

Our kernel comman line option list, after root=UUID...:

   ro nosplash INIT_VERBOSE=yes init=/sbin/init -v

The INIT_VERBOSE is used by some upstart scripts, and the -v gives output on everything upstart does on boot. Not as pretty as the old boot, but potentially informative if the system hangs. Boot log messages appear on disk in /var/log/syslog, as init: entires like these:

  Jul 12 10:20:23 bricolage-20 init: ssh main process (573) became new process (580)
  Jul 12 10:20:23 bricolage-20 init: ssh state changed from spawned to post-start
  Jul 12 10:20:23 bricolage-20 init: ssh state changed from post-start to running 

Enjoy the Ubuntu Lucid server release with a functional console, complete with boot status messages and boot logging.