DragonFly On-Line Manual Pages

DOWNTIMED(8)           DragonFly System Manager's Manual          DOWNTIMED(8)

NAME
       downtimed - system downtime monitoring and reporting daemon

SYNOPSIS
       downtimed [-D] [-d datadir] [-f timefmt] [-l log] [-p pidfile] [-S] [-s
       sleep]
       downtimed -v

DESCRIPTION
       The downtimed daemon waits in the background, frequently updating a
       time stamp file on the disk. If the daemon is killed with a signal
       associated with a normal system shutdown procedure, it will record the
       shutdown time on the disk.

       When the daemon is restarted during the next boot process, it will
       report how long the system was down and whether it was properly shut
       down or crashed. The downtime report is output to the system log or to
       a specified log file. Also a record is appended to the downtime
       database.

OPTIONS
       -D     Do not create nor update the downtime database.

       -d datadir
              The directory where the time stamp files as well as the downtime
              database are located. The default directory is determined at
              compile time.

       -f timefmt
              Specify the time and date format to use when reporting using
              strftime(3) syntax. The default is "%F %T".

       -l log Logging destination. If the argument contains a slash (/) it is
              interpreted to be a path name to a log file, which will be
              created if it does not exist already. Otherwise it is
              interpreted as a syslog facility name. The default logging
              destination is "daemon" which means that the messages are
              written to syslog with the daemon facility code.

       -p pidfile
              The location of the file which keeps track of the process ID of
              the running daemon process. The system default location is
              determined at compile time.

       -S     Normally fsync(2) is performed after each update of the time
              stamp. This option disables the fsync(2).  It reduces the load
              on the disk system but makes the downtime measurement less
              reliable.

       -s sleep
              Defines how long to sleep between each update of the on-disk
              time stamp file. More frequent updates result in more accurate
              downtime reporting in the case of a system crash. Less frequent
              updates decrease the amount of disk writes performed. The
              default is to sleep 15 seconds between each update. If you are
              using a flash memory based SSD or other disk which has limited
              amount of write cycles per block, it might be a good idea to set
              the sleep time to a higher value to prolong the lifetime of the
              storage device.

       -v     Display the program version number, copyright message and the
              default settings.

SIGNALS
       SIGHUP Close and re-open the output log. Use in case you want to rotate
              the log file.

       SIGTERM and SIGINT
              Terminate gracefully. These signals signify that a graceful
              system shutdown is in process.

EXIT STATUS
       The daemon exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.

SEE ALSO
       downtimes(1), syslog.conf(5), http://dist.epipe.com/downtimed/

BUGS
       The reporting accuracy in case of a system crash depends on how often
       the time stamp is updated.

       Finding out the system startup time is very operating system specific.
       If the program does not have specific code to support your operating
       system, it assumes that the system started when the daemon started.

       Reporting is inaccurate if the system clock changes during system
       downtime or startup process. Daylight saving time changes have no
       effect as all calculations are done using UTC.

COPYRIGHT
       Copyright (C) 2009-2013 EPIPE Communications. All rights reserved.

       Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
       modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are
       met:

       1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
       notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.

       2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
       notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
       documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.

       THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE AUTHOR AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND
       ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
       IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR
       PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED.  IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR OR CONTRIBUTORS
       BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR
       CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF
       SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR
       BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY,
       WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR
       OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF
       ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

       The views and conclusions contained in the software and documentation
       are those of the authors and should not be interpreted as representing
       official policies, either expressed or implied, of EPIPE
       Communications.

version 0.6                       2013-07-27                      DOWNTIMED(8)