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DBNet Foreign Alerts


Foreign alerts are the primary method for non-DBNet computers to submit data to DBNet. The foreign alert mechanism requires the remote user to 'put' a foreign alert into the DBNet foreign directory. This alert message is a simply an ASCII file containing one line of text. The exact format of the file and the specifics of each field are described below. DBNet will read the foreign alert and generate a local alert indicating where the data is stored. The data can be stored on the remote machine or it can be transferred to the DBNet host before generating a foreign alert. If the data is on the remote compute DBNet can be configured to retrieved the data automatically.

Foreign Alert Filename:

The name of the foreign alert file is not important to DBNet. What is important is that the name be unique enough so that it will not be overwritten by another foreign process. We suggest you use a name that indicates the name of the computer generating the file, the process id and the time that the foreign alert was generated i.e.: FALERT.ivavn.19345.960821152411

DBNet will move the file as soon as it is processed, we cannot however guarantee when it will be processed. Typically DBNet will service the foreign queue within 5-10 seconds.

FALERT file format:

The foreign alert file contains one line of text. There are nine required fields. White space is used to delimit the fields.

Field

Definition

IP Address

The IP address or hostname (as it is known by DBNet) of the of the computer where the data is stored. The data can be transferred to the DBNet computer before the foreign alert is generated and this field would be the name of the DBNet host computer.

full-path

The is the complete path of the data. This should be the path used to FTP the data to or from the computer.

time stamp

The timestamp of the file. the format is: YYMMDDHHMMSS. This field can be 0.

file size

The file size in bytes. This field can be zero.

Noop

Reseverd for future use. Literally the word 'noop' or 0.

noop

Reseverd for future use. Literally the word 'noop' or 0.

Type

The DBNet data type for this file.

Job

The name of the job that generated this file. This field is used to track data flows within DBNet and to the OSO Gateway

SubType

The DBNet data SubType for this file

A Sample foreign Alert:

140.90.56.24 /usr/local/dbndev/err/sst_tran_nsstsxs 960821053245 0 noop noop TRAN SSTSPDZ2 Polar_satellite_based_SSTs(TTAA...TTLA)

This alert indicates the file sst_tran_nsstsxs is available on the computer 140.90.56.24. The DBNet data type is TRAN and the SubType is Polar_satellite_based_SSTs(TTAA...TTLA).

See Also