rancid.conf.5.in

.\"
.hys 50
.TH "rancid.conf" "5" "10 June 2013"
.SH NAME
rancid.conf \- rancid environment configuration file
.SH DESCRIPTION
.B rancid.conf
contains environment configuration information for
.BR rancid-run (1)
and
.BR rancid-cvs (1),
including shell PATH, list of rancid groups, etc.
It is read by several scripts at run-time and others inherit the
configration from a parent process which has read it.
.PP
The syntax of
.B rancid.conf
is that of
.IR sh (1).
.B rancid.conf
is used to set environment variables used by other rancid scripts to
effect their run-time behavior or to enable them to find their resources.
.PP
.SH VARIABLES
The following variables are used (listed alphabetically):
.PP
.Bl -tag -width flag
.\"
.TP
.B ACLSORT
Permits disabling of access-list sorting, which could alter statement order
that had been cleverly crafted by the administrator for optimal performance,
thus making recovery and comparsion more difficult.
.sp
Default: YES
.\"
.TP
.B BASEDIR
BASEDIR is the directory where
.B rancid-run's
log directory, the revision control system's repository, and rancid group
directories will be placed.
.sp
Its value is configure's localstatedir and should be modified if rancid is
moved to a new location in the file system without re-installing from the
distribution.
.sp
Default: @localstatedir@
.\"
.TP
.B CVSROOT
.IR cvs (1)
and
.IR rancid-cvs (1)
use this environment variable to locate the CVS repository.
In some cases, and for Subversion, it is used as an argument to commands.
It should not be necessary to alter it.
.sp
Default: $BASEDIR/CVS
.\"
.TP
.B FILTER_PWDS
Determines which passwords will be filtered from configs.  The value may be
"NO", "YES", or "ALL" to filter none of the passwords, only those which are
reversable or plain-text, or all (plus ssh keys, etc), respectively.
.sp
Default: YES
.sp
Note: a value of "NO" could be a security issue since diffs are sent via
e-mail.  A value of "ALL" is encouraged.
.sp
Note:
.B FILTER_PWDS
does not affect the handling of SNMP community strings.  see
.B NOCOMMSTR
below.
.sp
Note: passwords whose value cycles and would produce erroneous diffs
are always filtered (e.g.: Alteon passwords).
.\"
.TP
.B LIST_OF_GROUPS
Defines a list of group names of routers separated by white-space.  These
names become the directory names in $BASEDIR which contain the data
for that set of devices.
.BR rancid-run (1)
also uses this variable to determine which device groups it should collect.
Choose these names to be descriptive of the set of devices and do not use
spaces, unprintable characters, etc.
.sp
Example: LIST_OF_GROUPS="UofO USFS"
.sp
Two groups are defined; UofO (University of Oregon) and USFS (US Forest
Service).  Each will have a directory created (see
.IR rancid-cvs (1))
$BASEDIR/UofO and $BASEDIR/USFS respectively, which will contain their data.
.sp
Each group must also have aliases for the administrative and diff recipients
set-up in
.IR /etc/aliases .
For example:
.sp
.in +1i
.nf
@MAILPLUS@uofo:            frank
@ADMINMAILPLUS@uofo:      joe,bob
@MAILPLUS@usfs:            frank
@ADMINMAILPLUS@usfs:      joe,bob
.fi
.sp
.in -1i
.\"
.TP
.B LOCKTIME
Defines the number of hours a group's lock file may age before rancid
starts to complain about a hung collection.  The default is 4 hours.
.\"
.TP
.B LOGDIR
Directory where
.B rancid-run
places log files.
.sp
Default: $BASEDIR/logs
.\"
.TP
.B MAILDOMAIN
Define the domain part of addresses for administrative and diff e-mail.
The value of this variable is simply appended to the normal mail addresses.
For example @MAILPLUS@usfs@example.com, if
.B MAILDOMAIN
had been set to "@example.com".
.\"
.TP
.B MAILHEADERS
Define additional mail headers to be added to rancid mail, such as Precedence
or X- style headers.
Individual headers must be separated by a \\n (new line).
.sp
Default: Precedence: bulk
.sp
Example: Precedence: bulk\\nX-clamation: beef cake
.\"
.TP
.B MAX_ROUNDS
Defines how many times rancid should retry collection of devices that fail.
The minimum is 1.
.sp
Default: 4.
.\"
.TP
.B NOCOMMSTR
If set,
.IR rancid (1)
will filter SNMP community strings from configs.  Otherwise, they will
be retained and may appear in clear-text in e-mail diffs.  By default,
this is not set.
.\"
.TP
.B NOPIPE
If set,
.IR rancid (1)
will use temporary files to save the output from the router and then read
these to build the file which will be saved in the revision control system 
(CVS, Subversion or Git).  Otherwise, an IPC pipe will be used.  We have found 
that the bufferingmechanisms used in perl and expect are heinous.
Using temporary files may result in a noticeable improvement in speed.
By default, this is not set.
.\"
.TP
.B OLDTIME
Specified as a number of hours, OLDTIME defines how many hours should pass
since a successful collection of a device's configuration and when
.IR control_rancid (1)
should start complaining about failures.  The value should be greater than
the number of hours between
.B rancid-run
cron runs.
.sp
Default: 24
.\"
.TP
.B PAR_COUNT
Defines the number of rancid processes that
.IR rancid_par (1)
will start simultaneously as
.IR control_rancid (1)
attempts to perform collections.  Raising this value will decrease the amount
of time necessary for a complete collection of a (or all) rancid groups at the
expense of system load.  The default is relatively cautious.  If collections
are not completing quickly enough for users, use trial and error of speed
versus system load to find a suitable value.
.sp
Default: 5
.\"
.TP
.B PATH
Is a colon separate list of directory pathnames in the the file system
where rancid's
.IR sh (1)
and
.IR perl (1)
scripts should look for the programs that it needs, such as
.IR telnet (1).
Its value is set by configure.  Should it be necessary to modify PATH,
note that it must include @bindir@.
.\"
.TP
.B RCSSYS
Sets which revision control system is in use.
Valid values are
.B cvs
for CVS
.B svn
for Subversion
or
.B git
for Git.
.sp
Default: cvs
.\"
.TP
.B TERM
Some Unix utilities require TERM, the terminal type, to be set to a sane
value.  Some clients, such as
.IR telnet (1)
and
.IR ssh (1) ,
communicate this to the server (i.e.: the remote device), thus this can
affect the behavior of login sessions on a device.  The default should
suffice.
.sp
Default: network
.\"
.TP
.B TMPDIR
Some Unix utilities recognize TMPDIR as a directory where temporary files
can be stored.  In some cases, rancid utilizes this directory for lock
files and other temporary files.
.sp
Default: /tmp
.\"
.PP
Each of these are simply environment variables.  In order for them to be
present in the environment of child processes, each must be exported.  See
.IR sh (1)
for more information on the built-in command export.
.SH ERRORS
.B rancid.conf
is interpreted directly by 
.IR sh (1),
so its syntax follows that of the bourne shell.  Errors
may produce quite unexpected results.
.SH FILES
.Bl -tag -width @sysconfdir@/rancid.conf -compact
.TP
.B @sysconfdir@/rancid.conf
Configuration file described here.
.El
.\"
.SH "SEE ALSO"
.BR control_rancid (1),
.BR rancid (1),
.BR rancid-cvs (1),
.BR rancid-run (1)
.\"
.SH HISTORY
In RANCID releases prior to 2.3,
.B rancid.conf
was named
.B env
and located in the bin directory.  This was changed to be more consistent
with common file location practices.