NAME¶

upscmd - UPS administration program for instant commands

SYNOPSIS¶

upscmd -h

upscmd -l ups

upscmd [-u username] [-p password] [-w] [-t <timeout>] ups command

DESCRIPTION¶

upscmd allows you to invoke "instant commands" in your UPS hardware. Not all hardware supports this, so check the list with -l to see if anything will work on your equipment.

On hardware that supports it, you can use this program to start and stop battery tests, invoke a front panel test (beep!), turn the load on or off, and more.

OPTIONS¶

-h

-l ups

-u username

-p password

-w

-t seconds

ups

UNATTENDED MODE¶

If you run this program inside a shell script or similar to invoke a command, you will need to specify all of the information on the command line. This means using -u and -p. Otherwise it will put up a prompt and your program will hang.

This is not necessary when displaying the list, as the username and password are not required for read-only mode.

Moreover, if you run this program inside a shell script or similar, you should only consider using output from stdout, not stderr.

DANGEROUS COMMANDS¶

Some drivers like apcsmart(8) have built-in paranoia for the dangerous commands like load.off. To make them actually turn off the load, you will have to send the command twice within a short window. That is, you will have to send it once, then send it again after 3 seconds elapse but before 15 seconds pass.

This paranoia is entirely defined within the driver. upsd and upscmd have no control over the timing.

DIAGNOSTICS¶

upscmd won’t work unless you provide a valid username and password. If you get "access denied" errors, make sure that your upsd.users(5) has an entry for you, and that the username you are using has permissions to SET variables.

BUGS¶

There is currently no way to tell the user when the driver requires confirmation to invoke a command such as load.off.

This is on the list of things to fix in the future, so don’t despair. It involves magic cookies.

SEE ALSO¶

upsd(8), upsrw(8)