RCORDER(8) BSD System Manager's Manual RCORDER(8)NAMErcorder — print a dependency ordering of interdependent files
SYNOPSISrcorder [-k keep] [-s skip] file ...
DESCRIPTION
The rcorder utility is designed to print out a dependency ordering of a
set of interdependent files. Typically it is used to find an execution
sequence for a set of shell scripts in which certain files must be exe‐
cuted before others.
Each file passed to rcorder must be annotated with special lines (which
look like comments to the shell) which indicate the dependencies the
files have upon certain points in the sequence, known as “conditions”,
and which indicate, for each file, which “conditions” may be expected to
be filled by that file.
Within each file, a block containing a series of “REQUIRE”, “PROVIDE”,
“BEFORE” and “KEYWORD” lines must appear. The format of the lines is
rigid. Each line must begin with a single ‘#’, followed by a single
space, followed by “PROVIDE:”, “REQUIRE:”, “BEFORE:”, or “KEYWORD:”. No
deviation is permitted. Each dependency line is then followed by a
series of conditions, separated by whitespace. Multiple “PROVIDE”,
“REQUIRE”, “BEFORE” and “KEYWORD” lines may appear, but all such lines
must appear in a sequence without any intervening lines, as once a line
that does not follow the format is reached, parsing stops.
The options are as follows:
-k Add the specified keyword to the “keep list”. If any -k option
is given, only those files containing the matching keyword are
listed.
-s Add the specified keyword to the “skip list”. If any -s option
is given, files containing the matching keyword are not listed.
An example block follows:
# REQUIRE: networking syslog
# REQUIRE: usr
# PROVIDE: dns nscd
This block states that the file in which it appears depends upon the
“networking”, “syslog”, and “usr” conditions, and provides the “dns” and
“nscd” conditions.
A file may contain zero “PROVIDE” lines, in which case it provides no
conditions, and may contain zero “REQUIRE” lines, in which case it has no
dependencies. There must be at least one file with no dependencies in
the set of arguments passed to rcorder in order for it to find a starting
place in the dependency ordering.
DIAGNOSTICS
The rcorder utility may print one of the following error messages and
exit with a non-zero status if it encounters an error while processing
the file list.
Requirement %s has no providers, aborting. No file has a “PROVIDE” line
corresponding to a condition present in a “REQUIRE” line in another file.
Circular dependency on provision %s, aborting. A set of files has a cir‐
cular dependency which was detected while processing the stated condi‐
tion.
Circular dependency on file %s, aborting. A set of files has a circular
dependency which was detected while processing the stated file.
BUGS
The “REQUIRE” keyword is misleading: It doesn't describe which daemons
have to be running before a script will be started. It describes which
scripts must be placed before it in the dependency ordering. For exam‐
ple, if your script has a “REQUIRE” on “named”, it means the script must
be placed after the “named” script in the dependency ordering, not neces‐
sarily that it requires named(8) to be started or enabled.
SEE ALSOrc(8)HISTORY
The rcorder utility first appeared in NetBSD 1.5.
AUTHORS
Written by Perry E. Metzger ⟨perry@piermont.com⟩ and Matthew R. Green
⟨mrg@eterna.com.au⟩.
BSD June 9, 2008 BSD