Re: how to parse oncheck output?

In article <35226b6a.35944921@gate.idg.no>, Nils Myklebust <Nils.Myklebust@nmdata.com> writes >This is one of the better questions asked at c.d.i. lately. >I wish someone would take it up and at least say what they do with the >output from the oncheck commands. I am getting rather bored from >looking at them and have a hard time makeing others do it. >Particularly at customer sites it seems quite stupid to have to tell >them to look at all this garbage coming out of the commands to no >avail. > Check out the -q (quiet) option! It is in 7.x!! >Nils Myklebust >NM Data AS > >On Mon, 23 Mar 1998 20:54:34 GMT, cos@zax.whoville.leftbank.com (Ofer >Inbar) wrote: > >>I've written a short script to run all of the consistency checks >>recommended in chapter 31 of the Administrator's Guide: >> >>---------------------------------------------------------------------- >>#!/usr/bin/perl >> >>open DBLIST, "echo 'select name,owner,created,flags from sysdatabases' >>| dbaccess sysmaster - 2>&1 |" >> or die "can't open dbacess pipe: $!\\n"; >>while (<DBLIST>) { push @dblist, $1 if >>/^(\\w+)\\s+\\S+\\s+\\d\\S+\\d\\s+\\d+\\s*$/ } >>close DBLIST; >> >>print `oncheck -cr`; >>print `oncheck -ce`; >>print `oncheck -cc`; >> >>foreach $db (@dblist) >>{ print `oncheck -cI $db`; >> print `oncheck -cD $db`; >>} >>---------------------------------------------------------------------- >> >>What I'd like to do is run it from crontab and have it mail its output >>to a few people. But, oncheck is really verbose! I'd like it to send >>mail only if there's an actual problem that someone needs to worry >>about. It would be trivial for me to change those backtick calls into >>opens of pipes, and have perl parse the output to figure out if it's >>worth mailing out. Unfortunately, I have no clue what to look for. >>There doesn't seem to be any regular format for what oncheck spews >>out, nor is the format of its messages and error indications >>documented anywhere that I can find. >> >>One possible rule might be: >> Look for the word "error". Starting with the line that has the word >>"error", continue until you reach a blank line. That block of text is >>the entire error message for an actual problem. >> >>If that were true, I could write my script accordingly. It seems like >>a plausible rule to me, based on what I've seen of oncheck output so >>far, but without documentation I just don't *know*. I don't want to >>make a guess that will end up suppressing actual error messages that >>we need to see, leading to a false sense of confidence. But I also >>don't want to mail out the entire output every day, because people >>will stop reading it. >> >>I posted this question once before, about a year ago. I got one >>followup, but it was a big .shar of a bunch of shell & sed scripts >>that did a whole bunch of things not directly related to my question, >>and it was written for and tested Informix 5 whereas I'm running 7.22 >> >>I don't actually want any scripts, because I want to tailor my script >>to our local needs anyway, and I definitely want to keep it all in >>perl. All I want is some documentation, or pointer to documentation, >>or description, of all the kinds of output oncheck might produce and >>how an automated script is supposed to be able to figure out what is >>important to report about. Since our database is mostly fine, and has >>always been so, I've never actually SEEN any real errors reported by >>oncheck, so I have no idea what they would look like when they do >>appear. I want to make sure my script will be able to handle anything >>oncheck throws at it. For example, being told "a serious error will >>aways start with the word 'ERROR:'", in and of itself, isn't helpful >>because perhaps some errors give multiline output, and I'd need to >>know how to identify those, and how to identify where the error >>message ends. >> >>I'm not afraid of reading manuals, but I just can't find this >>information and I don't know where to look for it. >> >> -- Cos (Ofer Inbar) -- cos@leftbank.com cos@cs.brandeis.edu >> -- The Left Bank Operation -- lbo@leftbank.com http://www.leftbank.com/ >> It's been said that if a sysadmin does his job perfectly, he's the >> fellow that people wonder what he does and why the company needs him, >> until he goes on vacation. -- comp.unix.admin FAQ > >Nils Myklebust >NM Data AS >Norway >E-mail: Nils.Myklebust@nmdata.com >FAQ at: Primary with ODBC info: http://www.smooth1.demon.co.uk > Official site http://www.iiug.org/techinfo/faq/faq_top.html -- David Williams Maintainer of the Informix FAQ Primary site (Beta Version) http://www.smooth1.demon.co.uk Official site http://www.iiug.org/techinfo/faq/faq_top.html I see you standin', Standin' on your own, It's such a lonely place for you, For you to be If you need a shoulder, Or if you need a friend, I'll be here standing, Until the bitter end... So don't chastise me Or think I, I mean you harm... All I ever wanted Was for you To know that I care