Nut upsuser - Apr 2023 - nut server without nut-client/monitor?

On 4/6/23 18:12, Greg Troxel wrote:
> Orion Poplawski via Nut-upsuser <nut-upsuser at
alioth-lists.debian.net>
> writes:
> 
>> Would it be at all useful to have just the nut "server"
components installed
>> and running on a machine without a nut-monitor service running?
> 
> It really depends on your goals and your overall plan.
> 
> Generally, upsd and drivers just accumulate state and provide it to
> clients, so they don't tend to be truly useful by themselves.
> 
> You could run a custom client that logs and reports state against upsd.
> 
> You could run upsmon across the network.  However, the shutdown process
> assumes upsmon is local.
> 
> However, there's a normal plan, and if what you are doing is even sort
of
> normal, it's likely best to do the normal thing, unless you can
> articulate why you want something different.
> 
> So:
> 
>    0) Read some stuff on the web:
>       https://xyproblem.info/
>       https://dontasktoask.com/ (not quite on point)
>       
>    1) Tell us your situation and what you want to accomplish.
> 
>    2) Tell us why, after having read the docs, you are heading towards a
>    non-standard setup.
To explain the motivation behind my question - I'm looking at tweaking 
the Fedora RPMs and noticed that currently the "nut" server package 
requires the "nut-client" package to also be installed (though not the
reverse obviously).  With some effort we can split things up so one 
could install just the "nut" package.  But I'm thinking this
really
isn't particularly useful or interesting.  But I figured I would ask.


-- 
Orion Poplawski
he/him/his  - surely the least important thing about me
IT Systems Manager                         720-772-5637
NWRA, Boulder/CoRA Office             FAX: 303-415-9702
3380 Mitchell Lane                       orion at nwra.com
Boulder, CO 80301                 https://www.nwra.com/

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Isn't "nut" package there an umbrella/meta-package (in terms of
other
distros) to pull together the likely suspects in one command?

Not at a computer now, but I think Debian and OpenIndiana packages were
grouped this way. Likely all packages with daemons would depend on a
"nut-common" package then, to consistently deliver user accounts,
systemd-tmpfiles and other similar shared bits.

Otherwise, taking the question at face value, a standalone NUT server
without a client can make sense on a system connected to an UPS to monitor
and manage it, but not powered by it - so it does not have to shut itself
down. Even then however, verifying the setup without an `upsc` or managing
it without `upsrw`/`upscmd`/... would be cumbersome (though possible with
telnet or other clients), and a "primary"/"master" mode
upsmon watching the
UPS as powering 0 PSUs of that box is recommended to send out FSD commands
etc.

Not sure if we have example setups to power off such an UPS (as we would
normally when the primary system is also fed by it and goes down last with
special handling).

Jim

On Fri, Apr 7, 2023, 03:47 Orion Poplawski via Nut-upsuser <
nut-upsuser at alioth-lists.debian.net> wrote:
> On 4/6/23 18:12, Greg Troxel wrote:
> > Orion Poplawski via Nut-upsuser <nut-upsuser at
alioth-lists.debian.net>
> > writes:
> >
> >> Would it be at all useful to have just the nut "server"
components
> installed
> >> and running on a machine without a nut-monitor service running?
> >
> > It really depends on your goals and your overall plan.
> >
> > Generally, upsd and drivers just accumulate state and provide it to
> > clients, so they don't tend to be truly useful by themselves.
> >
> > You could run a custom client that logs and reports state against
upsd.
> >
> > You could run upsmon across the network.  However, the shutdown
process
> > assumes upsmon is local.
> >
> > However, there's a normal plan, and if what you are doing is even
sort of
> > normal, it's likely best to do the normal thing, unless you can
> > articulate why you want something different.
> >
> > So:
> >
> >    0) Read some stuff on the web:
> >       https://xyproblem.info/
> >       https://dontasktoask.com/ (not quite on point)
> >
> >    1) Tell us your situation and what you want to accomplish.
> >
> >    2) Tell us why, after having read the docs, you are heading towards
a
> >    non-standard setup.
>
> To explain the motivation behind my question - I'm looking at tweaking
> the Fedora RPMs and noticed that currently the "nut" server
package
> requires the "nut-client" package to also be installed (though
not the
> reverse obviously).  With some effort we can split things up so one
> could install just the "nut" package.  But I'm thinking this
really
> isn't particularly useful or interesting.  But I figured I would ask.
>
>
> --
> Orion Poplawski
> he/him/his  - surely the least important thing about me
> IT Systems Manager                         720-772-5637
> NWRA, Boulder/CoRA Office             FAX: 303-415-9702
> 3380 Mitchell Lane                       orion at nwra.com
> Boulder, CO 80301                 https://www.nwra.com/
>
> _______________________________________________
> Nut-upsuser mailing list
> Nut-upsuser at alioth-lists.debian.net
> https://alioth-lists.debian.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/nut-upsuser
>
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Orion Poplawski via Nut-upsuser <nut-upsuser at alioth-lists.debian.net>
writes:
> To explain the motivation behind my question - I'm looking at tweaking
> the Fedora RPMs and noticed that currently the "nut" server
package
> requires the "nut-client" package to also be installed (though
not the
> reverse obviously).  With some effort we can split things up so one
> could install just the "nut" package.  But I'm thinking this
really
> isn't particularly useful or interesting.  But I figured I would ask.
That question makes a lot more sense!

I maintain the nut package in pkgsrc, and we have one for server and
clients, but without usb, and then one with usb.  The basic one is only
10 MB.   But pkgsrc tends to split less than many GNU/Linux
distributions.

I can't imagine wanting to have the server without "upsc" in any
even
slightly normal system.  Running upsc tells you the status, and even if
you don't really care about most of that, confirms that the server is
working.  It would really be an extreme embedded case to want to save
that space, and then it would be far more important to remove all
drivers that are not for your hardware, SNMP and USB support if not
used, etc.  Put another way, it's like ntpd without ntpq.  

You might want to split out nut-scanner.  But it's not really that big,
and I'm not sure how the maintenance effort trades off with space
savings.

All in all I find it sensible for the package with ${prefix}/sbin/upsd
and ${prefix}/libexec/[drivers] to depend on nut-client.  It's hard to
think of an actual user that would be bothered by this, that wouldn't
also want to hand-pick everything else about their system, because say
they are fitting in 4 MB of flash on an embedded box that does only
limited things.