{"id":23,"date":"2008-05-26T22:45:47","date_gmt":"2008-05-26T20:45:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/?p=23"},"modified":"2024-05-13T01:15:46","modified_gmt":"2024-05-12T23:15:46","slug":"making-your-server-box-talk-like-in-those-old-movies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/making-your-server-box-talk-like-in-those-old-movies\/","title":{"rendered":"Making your server box talk like in those old movies"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

This is a silly geek thing but you might like it. Why not let your penguin-server talk to you when it needs updates or other interesting things happen?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Code and config in these examples are tested on a debian box.<\/p>\n

\u00a0What we need:
\n-A software for speech synthesis
\nespeak is good for this purpose. quiet configurable and the voice quality is OK.<\/p>\n

apt<\/span>-<\/span>get install espeak<\/span> <\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/code><\/p>\n

-A software that can trigger events, when certain log entries appear
\nswatch is our friend here. it reads logs in realtime and triggers a command if a specific pattern is found.
\nIn our case it will just trigger espeak to say something.<\/p>\n

apt<\/span>-<\/span><\/strong>get install swatch<\/strong><\/span> <\/span><\/span><\/code><\/p>\n

Now that we have our tools lets make a sample talker…
\nWe want our box to report, if new (no-spam) mail arrived.<\/p>\n

I’m using spamassassin to filter my mail.
\nI get a line similar to<\/p>\n

Jul 26 16<\/span><\/span>:<\/span>34<\/span>:<\/span>04 star spamd<\/span>[<\/span>13365<\/span>]: <\/span>spamd<\/span>: <\/span>clean message <\/span>(-<\/span>2.4<\/span>\/<\/span>0.5<\/span>) for <\/span>mailbox<\/span>:<\/span>1001 in 1.9 seconds<\/span>, <\/span>7128 bytes<\/span><\/em>.<\/em><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/code><\/p>\n

<\/em>
\n<\/span>in <\/span>\/var\/<\/span>log<\/span>\/<\/span>mail<\/span>.<\/span><\/strong>log <\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/code>everytime a good messages reaches my inbox.<\/p>\n

So create a config file for swatch to look out for lines like that<\/p>\n

File: \/etc\/swatch\/ham
\n
\nwatchfor <\/span><\/span>\/<\/span>clean message<\/span>\/
\n<\/span>exec <\/span><\/strong>\"espeak new_mail &\"<\/strong><\/span>
\n<\/span><\/span><\/code>
\nThe only thing left to do now is to start the swatch daemon<\/p>\n

\/<\/span>usr<\/span>\/<\/span>bin<\/span>\/<\/span>swatch <\/span>--<\/span>daemon <\/span><\/span>--<\/span>config<\/span>-<\/span>file<\/span>=\/<\/span>etc<\/span>\/<\/span>swatch<\/span>\/<\/span>ham <\/span>--<\/span>tail<\/span>-<\/span>file<\/span>=\/var\/<\/span>log<\/span>\/<\/span>mail<\/span>.<\/span><\/strong>log<\/strong><\/span>
\n<\/span><\/span><\/code>I think you got the point. The possibilities are endless. Everything that is logged can be spoken.<\/p>\n

But there are other interesting possibilities. Lets say you want your box to report new available updates to you.
\nThis little script can do it when run from a repeating cron-job:<\/p>\n


\n<\/span>#!\/bin\/bash<\/span>
\n<\/span>apt<\/span>-<\/span>get update
\nUPDATELINE<\/span>=`<\/span>apt-get --simulate upgrade | grep remove<\/span>`
\n<\/span>EINS<\/span>=`<\/span>echo $UPDATELINE | cut -d \" \" -f 1<\/span>`
\n<\/span>ZWEI<\/span>=`<\/span>echo $UPDATELINE | cut -d \" \" -f 3<\/span>`
\n<\/span>DREI<\/span>=`<\/span>echo $UPDATELINE | cut -d \" \" -f 6<\/span>`
\n<\/span>VIER<\/span>=`<\/span>echo $UPDATELINE | cut -d \" \" -f 10<\/span>`<\/span>
\n((<\/span><\/span>UPDATES<\/span>=<\/span>EINS<\/span>+<\/span>ZWEI<\/span>+<\/span>DREI<\/span>+<\/span>VIER<\/span>))
\nif [ <\/span>$UPDATES <\/span>-<\/span>gt 0 <\/span>]; <\/span>then
\nespeak <\/span>\"REPORT: i need $UPDATES updates! please install as soon as possible\"
\n<\/span><\/strong>fi<\/strong><\/span>
\n<\/span><\/span><\/code><\/p>\n

Now you have got all the tools to make your server an absolutely anoying brabbling box.
\nEnjoy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

How to make a linux server talk<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[227],"tags":[9],"class_list":["post-23","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-linux","tag-sprachausgabe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1926,"href":"https:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23\/revisions\/1926"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.daniel-ritter.de\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}