DOKK / manpages / debian 10 / rancid / control_rancid.1.en
control_rancid(1) General Commands Manual control_rancid(1)

control_rancid - run rancid for devices of a group

control_rancid [-V] [-c commit_msg] [-f config_file] [-m mail_rcpt] [-r device_name] group

control_rancid is a sh(1) script to parse a group's router.db(5), run rancid for each of the devices, possibly re-run rancid for devices that failed collection, e-mail diffs, and e-mail error reports.

control_rancid also creates and/or re-creates the .cvsignore/.gitignore files for each group. For the configs sub-directory, it includes ".old", where a user may keep files they would like to be ignored.

The command-line options are as follows:

Prints package name and version strings.
Specify an alternative SCM commit message.
Specify an alternative rancid.conf. The global rancid.conf file is read by rancid-run, which calls control_rancid for each group, and control_rancid reads the group-specific rancid.conf, thereby overriding the global file.

The group-specific rancid.conf may not exist.

Default: <BASEDIR>/<group>/rancid.conf

Specify the recipient of diff mail, which is normally rancid-<group>. The argument may be a single address, multiple comma separated addresses, or -m may be specified multiple times.
Specify the name, as it appears in the router.db, of a particular device to collect and generate diffs for. The device must be marked "up".

The -r option alters the subject line of the diff mail. It will begin with <group name>/<device name> rather than just the group name alone.

control_rancid is normally (and best) run via rancid-run(1) which provides a locking mechanism on a group basis and saves output in a log file for each group.

rancid-run(1), rancid.conf(5), router.db(5)

22 December 2016