CRASHED(8)

Bastard Sysadm from Hell Manual

CRASHED(8)

NAME

CRASHED - crash emulation daemon

SYNOPSIS

CRASHED [-options]

DESCRIPTION

Improves Unix to the standards of NT by crashing the system.

Actually better than the original because you can select when and from what the system will be crashed. Various options can be used to select at what time the system will be crashed. Using multiple options allows either of them to do the job.

This daemon will usually be started from init(8).

Its name is pronounced crash-e-daemon.

OPTIONS

-b, --blue-screen
emulate the "blue screen" visual interface, else simply the screen will freeze with whatever is on it.

-e, --esp [DEVICE]
use /dev/esp or the given DEVICE to detect when a user will be maximally inconvenienced.

-f, --kill-filesystem [DEVICE]
randomly write a few blocks of garbage to the root disk or to the disk named in DEVICE.

-k, --key-presses [PRESSES]
only crash after any user has entered at least PRESSES key presses, so enough work is lost.

-o, --operator-protect
don't crash while the operator is logged in, makes it easier to blame the users.

-r, --random
completely random timing, this overrides -e, -k, -o, -t if they are before -r on the command line, else they are added to -r.

-s, --save-resets
used together with -k this resets the counter whenever a user saves data, avoid useless crashes.

-t, --uptime [TIME]
after an specified amount of uptime(1), TIME in seconds.

-u, --user USER [USER]...
gives a list of users that must be logged in for crashing, together with -e or -k only those users are monitored.

KNOWN BUGS

-b will only look right on an PC CGA/EGA/VGA/SVGA compatible console.

-e requires an BrainWaive compatible mind reading interface.

-f is only probabilistic, the file system may be dead or not.

This daemon has to be started by the system manager. This essential functionality should really be in the Kernel - The nearest attempt of this so far, the Linux jiffies overrun crash, can be emulated with -t set to (2^31)/100.

Some users find this facility annoying.

SEE ALSO

frustrated(8)

HISTORY

The idea for this daemon literally fell out of the blue onto me. But the behaviour it produces has been extensively tested by an leading software firm.

AUTHOR

neil@franklin.ch, http://neil.franklin.ch/