uudemon.poll Command

Purpose

Polls the systems listed in the BNU Poll file.

Syntax

uudemon.poll

Description

The /usr/sbin/uucp/uudemon.poll command is a shell procedure used by the Basic Networking Utilities (BNU). In conjunction with the /etc/uucp/Poll file, the uudemon.hour command, and the /var/spool/cron/crontabs/uucp file, the uudemon.poll command initiates calls to remote systems.

The uudemon.poll command performs the following actions:

  • Polls (contacts) the systems listed in the Poll file (/etc/uucp/Poll).
  • Creates command (C.*) files for the systems listed in the Poll file.

The time at which you run the uudemon.poll command depends on the time at which you run the uudemon.hour command. In general, schedule the polling shell procedure before the hourly procedure. This schedule enables the uudemon.poll command to create any required command files before the cron daemon runs the uudemon.hour command.

Instruct the cron daemon to run the uudemon.poll command about 5 to 10 minutes before running the uudemon.hour command. To run this procedure automatically, remove the comment character (#) from the beginning of the uudemon.poll command line in the /var/spool/cron/crontabs/uucp file.
Note: The uudemon.poll command is not usually entered on the command line, but is executed by the cron daemon.

Example

To run the uudemon.poll shell procedure automatically, edit the /var/spool/cron/crontabs/uucp file and remove the # (comment character) at the beginning of the line which starts the uudemon.poll command. Change:

#20,50 * * * * /usr/bin/sh -c "/usr/sbin/uucp/uudemon.poll >  /dev/null"

to:

20,50 * * * * /usr/bin/sh -c "/usr/sbin/uucp/uudemon.poll >  /dev/null"
The 20,50 notation represents minutes, and the four asterisks (* * * *) are placeholders representing the hour of the day, the day of the month, the month of the year, and the day of the week, respectively. This line therefore instructs the cron daemon to run the uudemon.poll command at 20 minutes past the hour and again at 50 minutes past the hour-for example, at 8:20 and 8:50 a.m., and at 9:20 and 9:50 a.m.-every hour of every day.
Note: Change the times at which the cron daemon executes the uudemon.poll command to correspond to the times you set up for the uudemon.hour command. The defaults specified in the /var/spool/cron/crontabs/uucp file instruct the cron daemon to run the uudemon.poll command 5 minutes before running the uudemon.hour command.

Files

Item Description
/usr/sbin/uucp/* Contains the uudemon.poll and uudemon.hour commands and all the configuration files for BNU.
/etc/uucp/Poll Specifies when the BNU program should poll remote systems to initiate tasks.
/var/spool/cron/crontabs/uucp Schedules BNU jobs, including the uudemon.poll command, for the cron daemon.