Darn, ok. I am making a system in which uptime is key. So if the serial port fails to open, I need to know about it, or it attempts to restart itself before it gives up throwing an error. ;-)
I am actually using the Raspberry Pi as an entrance door controller. I have a cardswiper hooked up to a USB-Serial and the Pi is running my Jar file which monitors the reader on async_newdata and hits the server with the detected data. RFID or MagCard. Server replies Granted or Denied, and if Granted, the PiFace clicks the relay which feeds power to the door strike.
So far, its working great. Just need more robustness coded into it yet.