NUTUPSDRV

NAME

nutupsdrv - generic manual for unified NUT drivers

SYNOPSIS

nutupsdrv -h
nutupsdrv [OPTIONS]

DESCRIPTION

nutupsdrv is not actually a driver. This is a combined man page for the shared code that is the core of many drivers within the Network UPS Tools package.

For information on the specific drivers, see their individual man pages.

In general, all UPS drivers provide a communication channel between the UPS attached on device and the upsd daemon. The driver's task is to pass to the upsd process information about the UPS state and parameters.

The core has two modes of operation which are determined by the command line switches. In the normal mode, the driver will periodically poll the UPS for its state and parameters. The results of this command is presented to upsd. The driver will also handle setting variables and instant commands if available.

The driver can also instruct the UPS to shut down the load, possibly after some delay. This mode of operation is intended for cases when it is known that the UPS is running out of battery power and the systems attached must be turned off to ensure a proper reboot when power returns.

NOTE

You probably don't want to use any of these options directly. You should use upsdrvctl(8) to control your drivers, and ups.conf(5) to configure them. The rest of this manual describes options and parameters that generally are not needed by normal users.

OPTIONS

-h

display an help message without doing anything else. This will also list possible values for -x in that driver, and other help text that the driver's author may have provided.

-a id

autoconfigure this driver using the id section of ups.conf(5).

-D

Raise the debugging level. Use this multiple times to see more details.

-k

("kill" power) Force shutdown mode. The UPS will power off the attached load if possible.

You should use upsdrvctl shutdown whenever possible instead of calling this directly.

-r directory

The driver will chroot(2) to directory during initialization. This can be useful when securing systems.

In addition to the state path, many systems will require /dev/null to exist within directory for this to work. The serial ports are opened before the chroot call, so you do not need to create them inside the jail. In fact, it is somewhat safer if you do not.

-u username

If started as root, the driver will setuid(2) to the user id associated with username.

If you do not specify this value and start it as root, the driver will switch to the default value that was compiled into the code. This is typically 'nobody', and is far from ideal.

-x var=val

define a variable called var with the value of var in the driver. This varies from driver to driver - see the specific man pages for more information.

This is like setting var=val in the ups.conf(5), but -x overrides any settings from that file.

device

The /dev entry corresponding to the TTY the UPS is connected to. This is optional if you are using the -a autoconfiguration option, since the "port" entry in the ups.conf(5) will be used when available.

DIAGNOSTICS

Information about the startup process is printed to stdout. Additional messages after that point are available in the syslog. The ups clients such as upsc(8) can be used to query the status of a UPS.

PROGRAM CONTROL

You should always use upsdrvctl(8) to control the drivers. While drivers can be started by hand for testing purposes, it is not recommended for production use.