.\" $OpenBSD: watchdogd.8,v 1.7 2006/01/17 14:27:04 jmc Exp $ .\" .\" Copyright (c) 2005 Marc Balmer .\" .\" Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software for any .\" purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above .\" copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies. .\" .\" THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND THE AUTHOR DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES .\" WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF .\" MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR BE LIABLE FOR .\" ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES .\" WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN .\" ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF .\" OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE. .\" .Dd July 7, 2005 .Dt WATCHDOGD 8 .Os .Sh NAME .Nm watchdogd .Nd watchdog timer retrigger daemon .Sh SYNOPSIS .Nm watchdogd .Op Fl d .Op Fl i Ar interval .Op Fl p Ar period .Sh DESCRIPTION .Nm is a daemon to periodically retrigger the .Xr watchdog 4 timer device from userland. .Nm is designed to work in high load environments, where other methods (such as a shell script invoking .Xr sysctl 8 ) would involve too much overhead. .Pp The basic premise is that after every .Ar interval seconds, .Nm resets the hardware timer to .Ar period . See also .Xr watchdog 4 for more information on how watchdog timers work. .Pp The options are as follows: .Bl -tag -width Ds .It Fl d Do not daemonize. If this option is specified, .Nm will run in the foreground. .It Fl i Ar interval Specify how often, in seconds, .Nm should retrigger the hardware timer. If no interval is specified, the value of .Ar period (see below) divided by three is used. .It Fl p Ar period Set the hardware timer to expire in .Ar period seconds. The default is 30 seconds. .El .Sh SEE ALSO .Xr watchdog 4 , .Xr sysctl 8 .Sh HISTORY The .Nm program first appeared in .Ox 3.8 . .Sh AUTHORS .Nm was written by .An Marc Balmer Aq mbalmer@openbsd.org .