[plug] UPS's with Linux support

[Paul Wilson]

>You may not need to know battery temperature and operating life, just that
>mains is off and it's time to go.  Maybe that's done with a handshaking
wire


>> The s/w developer that I spoke to was claiming that the UPS tells the
>> server
>> useful (!) things like battery life, operating temperature etc. That
could
>> muddle things quite a bit.


Not according to the s/w developer I spoke to. It's all transmitted as a
serial data stream, and, if they wanted to make it proprietary (no, I
probably wouldn't agree with the reasons even if I knew them), then it's
pretty simple to make the effort of decoding the stream difficult enough to
keep most people at bay.

I don't have a huge amount of time to spend p***** about with the damned
thing, so I'll just have to put up with a bad situation until the Linux
software arrives in a few weeks.  However, I certainly won't get or
recommend another Alpha UPS.

Paul