Ubuntu Manpage: nutupsdrv - generic manual for unified NUT drivers

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.

UPS drivers provide a communication channel between the physical UPS hardware and the
upsd(8) server. The driver is responsible for translating the native protocol of the UPS
to the common format used by the rest of this package.

The core has three 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, as per the pollinterval parameter in ups.conf(5). The results of this command
are presented to upsd. The driver will also handle setting variables and instant commands
if available.

In the second mode, using -k, the driver can 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.

In the third mode, using -d, the driver will exit after some update loops, dumping the
data tree (in upsc-like format) to stdout. This can be useful to complement the
nut-scanner to discover devices, along with in-depth data.

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 a 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). This argument is
mandatory when calling the driver directly.

-s id
Configure this driver only with command line arguments instead of reading ups.conf(5).
To be used instead of -a option when need to run a driver not present in driver
configuration file. Instead, driver configuration have to be set with -x options
directly in the command line. As the driver instance cannot be controlled by
upsdrvctl(8), this option should be used for specific needs only.

-D
Raise the debugging level. Use this multiple times to see more details. Running a
driver in debug mode will (by default) prevent it from backgrounding after startup. It
will keep on logging information to the console until it receives a SIGINT (usually
Ctrl-C) or SIGTERM signal.

The level of debugging needed depends both on the driver and the problem you’re trying
to diagnose. Therefore, first explain the problem you have with a driver to a
developer/maintainer, before sending them debugging output. More often than not, if
you just pick a level, the output may be either too limited or too verbose to be of
any use.

-d update_count
Dump the data tree (in upsc-like format) to stdout after running the driver update
loop for update_count times and exit. By default this prevents the driver process from
backgrounding after startup. Note that the driver banner will be printed too, so when
using this option in scripts, don’t forget to trim the first line.

-q
Raise log level threshold. Use this multiple times to log more details.

The debugging comment above also applies here.

-F
Enforce running the driver as a foreground process, regardless of debugging or
data-dumping settings.

-B
Enforce running the driver as a background process, regardless of debugging or
data-dumping settings.

-i interval
Set the poll interval for the device. The default value is 2 (in seconds).

-V
Print only version information, then exit.

-L
Print a parsable list of driver variables. Mostly useful for configuration wizard
programs.

-k
("Kill" power) Forced 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
Override the unprivileged username that the driver may use after startup. If started
as root, after opening configuration files (and optionally calling chroot(2), as
described in the previous option), the driver will look up username in the passwd
database, then change to the user and group identities associated with username. (If
started with a nonzero UID or effective UID, the driver will silently ignore this
option.)

When compiling NUT from source, the default username is typically nobody, and this may
cause permission errors when the driver opens the UPS device node. You can use this
option to temporarily override the defaults. For testing purposes, you can set this
option to root to bypass permission errors, especially with USB-based drivers.
However, you will want to remove this option later in order to avoid permission
conflicts between the driver and the unprivileged copy of upsd(8).

-g groupname
Override the unprivileged group name that the driver may use after startup to set
permissions for the filesystem socket so upsd may still access it if the run-time user
of the driver normally would deny that access.

-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 ups.conf(5), but -x overrides any settings from that
file.

DIAGNOSTICS

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

FILES

       ups.conf
           Required configuration file. This contains all details on which drivers to start and
           where the hardware is attached.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES

       NUT_CONFPATH is the path name of the directory that contains upsd.conf and other
       configuration files. If this variable is not set, upsd uses a built-in default, which is
       often /usr/local/ups/etc.

       NUT_STATEPATH is the path name of the directory in which upsd keeps state information. If
       this variable is not set, upsd uses a built-in default, which is often /var/state/ups. The
       STATEPATH directive in upsd.conf(5) overrides this variable.

       NUT_ALTPIDPATH is the path name of the directory in which upsd and drivers store .pid
       files. If this variable is not set, upsd and drivers use either NUT_STATEPATH if set, or
       ALTPIDPATH if set, or otherwise the built-in default STATEPATH.

BUGS

       Some of the drivers may have bugs. See their manuals for more information.

   Server:
       •   upsd(8)

   Clients:
       •   upsc(8)

       •   upscmd(8)

       •   upsrw(8)

       •   upslog(8)

       •   upsmon(8)

   CGI programs:
       •   upsset.cgi(8)

       •   upsstats.cgi(8)

       •   upsimage.cgi(8)

   Driver control:
       •   nut-driver-enumerator(8)

       •   upsdrvctl(8)

       •   upsdrvsvcctl(8)

   Drivers:
       •   adelsystem_cbi(8)

       •   al175(8)

       •   apcsmart-old(8)

       •   apcsmart(8)

       •   apcupsd-ups(8)

       •   asem(8)

       •   bcmxcp(8)

       •   bcmxcp_usb(8)

       •   belkin(8)

       •   belkinunv(8)

       •   bestfcom(8)

       •   bestfortress(8)

       •   bestuferrups(8)

       •   bestups(8)

       •   blazer-common(8)

       •   blazer_ser(8)

       •   blazer_usb(8)

       •   clone(8)

       •   dummy-ups(8)

       •   etapro(8)

       •   everups(8)

       •   gamatronic(8)

       •   generic_modbus(8)

       •   genericups(8)

       •   huawei-ups2000(8)

       •   isbmex(8)

       •   ivtscd(8)

       •   liebert-esp2(8)

       •   liebert(8)

       •   macosx-ups(8)

       •   masterguard(8)

       •   metasys(8)

       •   mge-shut(8)

       •   mge-utalk(8)

       •   microdowell(8)

       •   microsol-apc(8)

       •   netxml-ups(8)

       •   nut-ipmipsu(8)

       •   nutdrv_atcl_usb(8)

       •   nutdrv_qx(8)

       •   nutdrv_siemens_sitop(8)

       •   oneac(8)

       •   optiups(8)

       •   phoenixcontact_modbus(8)

       •   pijuice(8)

       •   powercom(8)

       •   powerman-pdu(8)

       •   powerpanel(8)

       •   rhino(8)

       •   richcomm_usb(8)

       •   riello_ser(8)

       •   riello_usb(8)

       •   safenet(8)

       •   snmp-ups(8)

       •   socomec_jbus(8)

       •   solis(8)

       •   tripplite(8)

       •   tripplite_usb(8)

       •   tripplitesu(8)

       •   upscode2(8)

       •   usbhid-ups(8)

       •   victronups(8)

   Internet resources:
       The NUT (Network UPS Tools) home page: http://www.networkupstools.org/