The sceptic program checks each host with the ping
and rsh Unix (Linux) commands. If one of the command fails,
then the host is assumed to be down. This procedure repeats until the
specified retry counts, ten (10) is the default, then the program
output the list of down hosts.
The subjects can be specified with the host group format
(see scorehosts(1)) or the file
in which hostnames are listed. If none of them are specified, then the
scpetic commands read its standard input assuming that the
hostname list is fed.
When a ^C (SIGINT) is delivered, the program abort
the above checking procedure, and immediately output the list of hosts
which are not responding at the time.
The options available for sceptic:
- -r retry-count
-
Specifying the retry count. Default is ten (10).
- -v
-
When specified, the sceptic commands output the status of the
checking command (ping and rsh) each time.
- -n
-
When specified, the sceptic command outputs the list of host
which are responding.
- -b
-
When specfied, only the hostname without domain name is displayed.
- -l
-
When specified, the output host list is separated with newline
(\n). In default, hosts are separated with a space (blank) character.
- -g host-group
-
When specified, the sceptic comand checks the host specified
in the host-group. See
scorehosts(1) for the
specification format.
- -f host-group
-
When specified, the sceptic command checks the host listed in
the specified file.