Another Ubuntu 6.10 Question: Printing the results of a program into an HTML file?

[GTaudiophile]

At the command line, I can run checkraid.

Checkraid is an alias to...

'/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show'

Here is a sample result of checkraid:

Unit UnitType Status %Cmpl Port Stripe Size(GB) Blocks
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
u0 RAID-1 OK - - - 465.761 976771120
u0-0 DISK OK - p0 - 465.761 976771120
u0-1 DISK OK - p1 - 465.761 976771120



Question:

Is there any way I can set up a crontab that runs checkraid say once an hour and then "inserts" the results above into an HTML file?

 

[Alone]

echo `/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show` >> /var/www/status.html

How about something like that?

To set up a crontab:

At the terminal, type this:

crontab -e

Add this to the end of the file:

0 * * * * echo `/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show` >> /var/www/status.html

You could add styles and further formatting by adding a bit of HTML.

0 * * * * echo "<div style=\"status\">"`/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show`"</div>" >> /var/www/status.html

 

[GTaudiophile]

Nice.

I think I need more info on the HTML formatting part.

 

[Alone]

The idea of the HTML formatting is to make it easier to read. Basically what you can do is use a stylesheet (CSS) so that you can make a nice little box.

EDIT: If you want a breakdown of each part of that "command", just say the word.

 

[GTaudiophile]

Right now it all apears as a single string:

Unit UnitType Status %Cmpl Port Stripe Size(GB) Blocks<br> -----------------------------------------------------------------------<b
> u0 RAID-1 OK - - - 465.761 976771120<br>u0-0 DISK OK - p0 - 465.761 976771120<br>u0-1 DISK OK - p1 - 465.761 976771120

Edit: I have inserted breaks <br> where they need to be.

 

[Alone]

Oh that's fine if that's how you want it. It'll just look like a simple log.

I just like to go the extra mile. Here's what you want then:

0 * * * * echo `/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show` >> /var/www/status.html

 

[GTaudiophile]

Heh. What I mean to say is that echo `/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show` >> /var/www/status.html currently prints a single string and I DO want some formatting. I want the breaks where they should be so it looks like this:

Unit UnitType Status %Cmpl Port Stripe Size(GB) Blocks
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
u0 RAID-1 OK - - - 465.761 976771120
u0-0 DISK OK - p0 - 465.761 976771120
u0-1 DISK OK - p1 - 465.761 976771120

I am not sure where I insert the breaks. In the crontab?

 

[GTaudiophile]

And I see that if I keep running echo "<div style=\"status\">"`/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show`"</div>" >> /var/www/status.html it simply keeps on adding the string to the same file. I wonder if there is a way for it to simply replace the existing text.

 

[GTaudiophile]

Okay, I have the following in crontab:

59,14,29,44 * * * * rm -rf /var/www/status.html

00,15,30,45 * * * * echo `/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show` >> /var/www/status.html

 

[GTaudiophile]

Okay, the above works to my satisfaction.

It is now just an issue of formatting that output.

 

[Alone]

00,15,30,45 * * * * rm -rf /var/www/status.html && echo `/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show` >> /var/www/status.html

 

[GTaudiophile]

Ah, that is more elegant.

 

[Alone]

There's probably a way to have echo do it all itself, I just can't think of it.

 

[GTaudiophile]

Alone: YGPM.

 

[Alone]

The only way I can think of formatting it the way you want is to use php instead of HTML and str_replace lines to add the line breaks.

 

[GTaudiophile]

Ouch. Now that is a different ball of wax 🙂

 

[Nothinman]

00,15,30,45 * * * * rm -rf /var/www/status.html && echo `/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show` >> /var/www/status.html

A single > will replace the contents, there's no need to delete the file first.

 

[Alone]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

00,15,30,45 * * * * rm -rf /var/www/status.html && echo `/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show` >> /var/www/status.html

A single > will replace the contents, there's no need to delete the file first.

I knew it would be something simple.

 

[GTaudiophile]

So, this would be more elegant:

00,15,30,45 * * * * echo `/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show` > /var/www/status.html

 

[GTaudiophile]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

00,15,30,45 * * * * rm -rf /var/www/status.html && echo `/usr/local/bin/tw_cli /c0/u0 show` >> /var/www/status.html

A single > will replace the contents, there's no need to delete the file first.

Thanks for that.

Do you have any idea on how to better format this thing besides using PHP?

 

[Nothinman]

If you just want to insert <br> where the newlines are you could do quickly by piping the output through sed before putting it in the file. Something like 'sed -e s/\n/<br>/' which I haven't tested. Personally if I really wanted to have it look pretty on a webpage, I'd probably write a small perl script to format the output how I wanted.

 

[GTaudiophile]

Sort of like, read string into array, and after character X, insert <br>, after character Y, insert <P>, etc.?

I have done nothing in perl before.

 

[Nothinman]

Sort of, but it would probably be simpler than that, one of perl's strongpoints is string manipulation. But unless you want to actually learn perl that's probably not a good solution for you.

 

[GTaudiophile]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
Sort of, but it would probably be simpler than that, one of perl's strongpoints is string manipulation. But unless you want to actually learn perl that's probably not a good solution for you.

😛

I am sure installing it alone would be a challenge.

YGPM

 

[Nothinman]

I am sure installing it alone would be a challenge.

Nah, perl's part of the base install of Ubuntu.