Commands Reference, Volume 5

uudemon.hour Command

Purpose

Initiates file transport calls to remote systems using the BNU program.

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

The uudemon.hour command calls the following programs, which are involved in transferring files between systems at specified hourly intervals:

The uusched daemon first searches the spooling directory on the local system for command files that have not been transferred to the specified remote system, and then schedules the transfer of those files.
The uuxqt daemon searches the spooling directory for execute files that have been transferred to the local system but have not yet been processed on that system.

Instruct the cron daemon to run the uudemon.hour command at specified hourly intervals. The frequency at which you run the uudemon.hour command depends on the amount of file-transfer activity originating from the local computer. If users on the local system initiate a large number of file transfers, you may need to specify that the cron daemon should start the uudemon.hour command several times an hour. If the number of file transfers originating from the local system is low, you can probably specify a start time once every 4 hours, for example.

To run the uudemon.hour command automatically, remove the comment character (#) from the beginning of the uudemon.hour command line in the /var/spool/cron/crontabs/uucp file.

Note: The uudemon.hour command is not usually entered on the command line, but is executed by the cron daemon.

Example

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

#25,55 * * * * /usr/bin/sh -c "/usr/sbin/uucp/uudemon.hour >  /dev/null"

to:

25,55 * * * * /usr/bin/sh -c "/usr/sbin/uucp/uudemon.hour >  /dev/null"

The 25,55 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. Therefore, this line instructs the cron daemon to run the uudemon.hour command at 25 minutes past the hour and again at 55 minutes past the hour; for example, at 8:25 and 8:55 a.m., again at 9:25 and 9:55 a.m., and again every hour of every day.

Notes:

These run intervals are defaults. By altering them, you can change the times at which the cron daemon executes the uudemon.hour command to fit the needs of your site. For example, to run the uudemon.hour command once every 4 hours, enter the numeral 4 in the time-interval field.
If you change the run times for the uudemon.hour command, you should also change the run times for the uudemon.poll command so that it polls remote systems 5 to 10 minutes before the uudemon.hour command is run.

Files

/usr/sbin/uucp/uudemon.hour	Contains the uudemon.hour command.
/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.hour and uudemon.poll commands, for the cron daemon.

Related Information

The uudemon.poll command.

The cron daemon, uusched daemon, uuxqt daemon.

How to Set Up BNU Polling of Remote Systems in AIX 5L Version 5.1 System Management Guide: Communications and Networks.

Using BNU Maintenance Commands, Understanding the BNU Daemons in AIX 5L Version 5.1 System Management Guide: Communications and Networks.