NAME

       clientupdate - Xymon client update utility

SYNOPSIS

       clientupdate [options]

DESCRIPTION

       clientupdate  is  part  of  the  Xymon  client. It is responsible for updating an existing
       client installation from a central repository of  client  packages  stored  on  the  Xymon
       server.

       When  the  Xymon  client  sends  a  normal  client  report to the Xymon server, the server
       responds with the section of the client-local.cfg(5) file that is relevant to this client.
       Included  in  this  may  be  a  "clientversion" value. The clientversion received from the
       server is  compared  against  the  current  clientversion  installed  on  the  client,  as
       determined  by  the  contents  of  the  $XYMONHOME/etc/clientversion.cfg  file. If the two
       versions are not identical, clientupdate is launched to update the client installation.

OPTIONS

       --level
              Report the current clientversion.

       --update=NEWVERSION
              Attempt to update the client to NEWVERSION by fetching this version of  the  client
              software from the Xymon server.

       --reexec
              Used internally during the update process, see OPERATION below.

       --remove-self
              Used  internally  during  the  update  process.  This  option  causes  the  running
              clientupdate utility to delete itself - it is used during the  update  to  purge  a
              temporary copy of the clientupdate utility that is installed in $XYMONTMP.

USING CLIENTUPDATE IN XYMON

       To  manage  updating  clients  without  having  to  logon  to each server, you can use the
       clientupdate utility. This is how you setup the release of a new client version.

       Create the new client
              Setup the new client $XYMONHOME directory,  e.g.  by  copying  an  existing  client
              installation  to  an  empty directory and modifying it for your needs. It is a good
              idea to delete all files in the tmp/ and logs/ directories, since there is no  need
              to copy these over to all of the clients. Pay attention to the etc/ files, and make
              sure that they are suitable for the systems where  you  want  to  deploy  this  new
              client.  You can add files - e.g. extension scripts in the ext/ directory - but the
              clientupdate utility cannot delete or rename files.

       Package the client
              When your new client software is ready, create a tar-file of the  new  client.  All
              files  in  the tar archive must have file names relative to the clients' $XYMONHOME
              (usually,  ~xymon/client/).   Save  the  tar  file   on   the   Xymon   server   in
              ~xymon/server/download/somefile.tar.   Don't  compress  it.  It is recommended that
              you use  some  sort  of  operating-system  and  version-numbering  scheme  for  the
              filename,  but you can choose whatever filename suits you - the only requirement is
              that it must end with ".tar". The part of the filename  preceding  ".tar"  is  what
              Xymon will use as the "clientversion" ID.

       Configure which hosts receive the new client
              In  the  client-local.cfg(5) file, you must now setup a clientversion:ID line where
              the ID matches the filename you used for the tar-file. So if you have packaged  the
              new   client   into   the  file  linux.v2.tar,  then  the  corresponding  entry  in
              client-local.cfg would be clientversion:linux.v2.

       Wait for xymond to reload client-local.cfg
              xymond will automatically  reload  the  client-local.cfg  file  after  at  most  10
              minutes.  If  you  want  to  force an immediate reload, send a SIGHUP signal to the
              xymond process.

       Wait for the client to update
              The next time the client contacts the Xymon server to send the client data, it will
              notice the new clientversion setting in client-local.cfg, and will run clientupdate
              to install the new client software. So when the client runs the next time, it  will
              use the new client software.

OPERATION

       clientupdate runs in two steps:

       Re-exec step
              The first step is when clientupdate is first invoked from the xymonclient.sh script
              with the "--re-exec"  option.  This  step  copies  the  clientupdate  program  from
              $XYMONHOME/bin/  to  a temporary file in the $XYMONTMP directory.  This is to avoid
              conflicts when the update procedure installs a  new  version  of  the  clientupdate
              utility   itself.   Upon   completion   of  this  step,  the  clientupdate  utility
              automatically launches the next step by  running  the  program  from  the  file  in
              $XYMONTMP.

       Update step
              The  second  step downloads the new client software from the Xymon server.  The new
              software must be packed into a tar file, which clientupdate then unpacks  into  the
              $XYMONHOME directory.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES

       clientupdate uses several of the standard Xymon environment variables, including XYMONHOME
       and XYMONTMP.

SEE ALSO

       xymon(7), xymon(1), client-local.cfg(5)