9 Command Line Usage

When run without arguments, pies parses and loads the configuration file, detaches itself from the controlling terminal (becomes a daemon), and starts all components. Before actually starting up, it ensures that no another copy is already running, by looking for a PID file and verifying that the PID listed there is alive and responding. If another copy is running, pies refuses to start up.

It is often necessary to run several copies of pies with different configuration files. To support such usage, pies provides a notion of instance. Pies instance is an independent invocation of pies that uses a separate configuration file and separate state files (see State Files). Instances are created using the --instance option:

--instance=name

Read configuration from sysconfdir/name.conf, use name as the base name for state files (i.e., they become name.pid, name.clt, etc.) and tag all syslog messages with name.

For example, the following invocations create three instances of pies:

pies
pies --instance=inetd
pies --instance=mta

The first instance uses the default configuration and state files. The second one reads configuration from /etc/inetd.conf, and the third one reads it from /etc/mta.conf.

After startup, you can verify the status of the running process using the --status option.

$ pies --status
smtps/stderr R  4697
pmult/stderr R  4677
pmult/stdout R  4676
pmult        CR 4678 /usr/local/sbin/pmult
smar         CR 4680 smar -f /etc/meta1/meta1.conf -d 100
qmgr         CR 4691 qmgr -f /etc/meta1/meta1.conf
smtpc        CR 4696 smtpc -f /etc/meta1/meta1.conf
smtps        PR 4698 smtps -d100 -f /etc/meta1/meta1.conf
finger       IL inet+tcp://0.0.0.0:finger /usr/sbin/in.fingerd -u
eklogin      IL inet+tcp://0.0.0.0:eklogin /usr/sbin/klogind -k -c -e
kshell       IL inet+tcp://0.0.0.0:kshell /usr/sbin/kshd -k -c
eklogin      IR 13836  /usr/local/sbin/klogind -k -c -e

See piesctl list, for a description of the output format.

You can restart any component by using the --restart-component (-R) option, e.g.:

$ pies -R pmult smtps

To stop all running components and shut down pies, use the --stop (-S) command line option:

$ pies --stop

If you modified the configuration file, you can instruct pies to read it again using the --reload (-r) command line option.

The --status, --restart-component, --stop, and --reload options actually run the piesctl command, which provides a powerful tool for managing pies. See piesctl, for a detailed description.

Two options are provided for verifying inter-component dependencies. The --dump-depmap option prints on the standard output the dependency map. This map is a square matrix with rows representing dependents and columns representing prerequisites. An ‘X’ sign is placed on each crossing which corresponds to the actual dependency. For example:

$ pies --dump-depmap
Dependency map:
    0  1  2  3  4
 0                
 1                
 2     X          
 3        X       
 4     X  X       

Legend:
 0: pmult
 1: smar
 2: qmgr
 3: smtpc
 4: smtps

This example corresponds to the configuration file shown in Hairy Pies. To illustrate how to read it, consider the 4th row of the table. According to the legend, number 4 means ‘smtps’ component. There are two ‘X’ marks: in columns 1 and 2. This means that ‘smtps’ depends on ‘smar’ and ‘qmgr’.

You can also list prerequisites explicitly:

$ pies --trace-prereq
qmgr: smar
smtpc: qmgr
smtps: smar qmgr

To list prerequisites for a particular component, give its name in the command line:

$ pies --trace-prereq smtps
smtps: smar qmgr

Any number of components can be given in the command line.

A counterpart option --trace-depend lists dependencies. Its usage is similar to the described above:

$ pies --trace-depend
smtps
smtpc
qmgr: smtps, smtpc
smar: smtps, qmgr

$ pies --trace-depend qmgr
qmgr: smtps, smtpc