NAME

       changetrack - track changes to files

SYNOPSIS

       changetrack  [-h]  [-c configfile] [-d directory] [-e] [-r] [-q] [-m message] [-M message]
       [-v] [-u] [-o toaddress] [-f fromaddress]

DESCRIPTION

       changetrack is a program to monitor changes to a bunch of files. If files are modified one
       day,  and  the machine starts working incorrectly some days later, changetrack can provide
       information on which files were modified, and help locate the problem.

       Normally changetrack uses  ed  to  keep  track  of  various  revisions  of  the  files  by
       maintaining an .ed script with the change history for each file.

       Alternatively,  changetrack  can  use rcs to keep track of various revisions of the files.
       Each file is "installed" in the rcs system the first time that changetrack  is  run  after
       that  file  is added to the config file. Whenever changetrack is run after that, a copy of
       the file is made, which is 'checked in' and implicitly 'checked out' of  the  rcs  system.
       See the man page of co for information on retrieving an old version of the file.

       Backup files (ending in tilde ~) are ignored, unless explicitely included.

       After each pattern in the file list, adding white space, a colon (:) then more whitespace,
       followed by email addresses, separated by more whitespace, will result in the  changes  to
       that  file  being  emailed to that address. All changes from each run are expressed in one
       email. Using the email feature requires Mail::SendMail to be installed;  if  it  does  not
       work correctly, an error message will be printed to standard error.

OPTIONS

       -h     Display a short help message then exit.

       -cconfigfile
              Get  the  list  of  files to track from configfile instead of from ~/.changetrackrc
              (/etc/changetrack.conf for the super-user)

       -doutputdirectory
              Store    output    in    outputdirectory    instead    of    in     ~/.changetrack/
              (/var/lib/changetrack/ for the super-user)

       -e     Keep  a  copy  of  the  file  from  when  it  was  first  added  to the changetrack
              configuration, and keep ed -styled changes to rebuild the  file.   This  option  is
              recommended only if rcs does not work on the machine.  To recover using this means,
              the .ed file should have the last several commands removed, to allow the file to be
              rebuilt   to   the   appropriate   state.  A  command  like  'cat  myfile.ed  |  ed
              myfile.original' should be executed.

       -r     Disable the rcs facility.

       -q     Quiet mode; only print critical messages. Good for scripts.

       -mmessage
              Print message on each file, after checking for any  changes.  Good  for  indicating
              reboots or other system events.

       -Mmessage
              Like -m, but message is only printed on modified files.

       -v     Print version and exit.

       -u     Use unified diffs (this only works with some implementations of diff.

       -oemailaddress
              Mail  output  to  emailaddress.  This  is  supplementary to emails specified in the
              config file.

       -femailaddress
              Set "From" header to emailaddress, which must be fully qualified.

REQUIREMENTS

       This program requires diff.  Unless the -r switch is used, this program requires rcs to be
       installed. If the -e switch is used, ed is required.

FILES

       ~/.changetrackrc
              List  of files to monitor. Each line may start with '#' indicating a comment.  If a
              line is not a comment, it contains a file/pattern to monitor, and optionally " :  "
              followed  by  any email addresses to send changes to. The filename may be a pattern
              described in the same way as for ls.  Note: the  default  is  /etc/changetrack.conf
              for root.

       ~/.changetrack/
              Default   directory   in   which  to  store  output  information.  The  default  is
              /var/lib/changetrack/ for root. All rcs files are stored in this directory,  unless
              a  subdirectory  called  RCS exists, in which case the rcs files are stored in that
              directory.

       /etc/cron.daily/changetrack
              Script that creates the list of all files monitor.

       /etc/cron.hourly/changetrack
              Script that invocates changetrack.

       /etc/default/changetrack
              Configuration for the above two scripts.

DIAGNOSTICS

       Each filename is written to standard output.  rcs will print errors if certain  things  go
       wrong.  It  will  also  print a few lines each time changetrack is run after a new file is
       added to the configuration.

IDENTIFICATION

       Author: Cameron J. Morland.
       Manual Page Revision: 2.1 Release Date: 2001-03-06.
       Copyright © 2001-2005 Cameron J. Morland.
       Changed by Jens Peter Secher to reflect the Debian modifications.

SEE ALSO

       ed(1), rcsintro(1), co(1)

TODO

       Automate removal of out-of-date changes, to save disk  space  and  clarify  the  important
       changes.

BUGS

       None known.

                                                                                   CHANGETRACK(1)