nslinkrelease(8)

📦 version 7.34, in alpine 3.22, alpine 3.23, alpine 3.24

🎀 NAME 🎀

okay bestie, welcome to nslinkrelease(8), a Comtrol manual page. nslinkrelease is the command-line utility that forces an in-use port on a DeviceMaster to be released so it becomes available again. 💅

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

nslinkrelease /dev/ttySIXX

nslinkrelease xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx [ethX] portnumber

nslinkrelease ipHost portnumber

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

nslinkrelease is a command-line utility used to force an in-use port on a DeviceMaster to be released in order to make it available.

nslinkrelease uses one of three methods to force the port to be released:

💖 nslinkrelease /dev/ttySIXX 💖

If nslinkrelease is invoked with a single parameter, that parameter is assumed to be the full path of an nslink device file (e.g. /dev/ttySI0, /dev/ttySI23). An ioctl() call will be made on the NS-Link driver requesting that an appropriate port-release command be sent to the DeviceMaster. The NS-Link driver must be installed and running to use this method.

🎀 nslinkrelease xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx [ethX] portnumber 🎀

If nslinkrelease is invoked with two or three parameters and the first parameter is an Ethernet address of the form xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx, then raw "MAC-mode" Ethernet communications will be used to send the port-release command directly to the DeviceMaster. The Ethernet interface to be used may be optionally specified. If no Ethernet interface is specified, eth0 is used. Using this method on a host that is also using the NS-Link driver in MAC mode is not recommended.

That last bit is the warning, bestie: not recommended on a host that’s already using the NS-Link driver in MAC mode. noted. 🫡

🌸 nslinkrelease ipHost portnumber 🌸

If nslinkrelease is invoked with two parameters and the first parameter is not an Ethernet address, then TCP/IP communications is used to send the port-release command directly to the DeviceMaster. The first parameter may be either a host name or IP address in dotted-quad notation. This method may be used on any host -- including one running the NS-Link driver either in MAC or TCP mode.

nslinkrelease.c is the C source code. For examples of how to force a port release see the functions devRelease(), macRelease() and tcpRelease(). nslinkrelease.py is the same program written in Python (it requires Python 2.0 or newer).

💀 RETURN VALUE 💀

nslinkrelease will produce no output and return success if the DeviceMaster responded as expected. An error (non-zero) exit code can be caused by a number of errors:

  • invalid device specified
  • wrong IP or Ethernet address
  • invalid hostname
  • invalid port number

If there is an error, an error message should be generated on stderr.

NB: If an invalid port number is provided in TCP or Ethernet mode, there will be no response from the DeviceMaster, and nslinkrelease will timeout and return an error. 😭

🌈 ENVIRONMENT 🌈

nslinkrelease does not use any environment variables. periodt. 💅

🫶 SEE ALSO 🫶

🐛 BUGS 🐛

Check the release notes file for an up-to-date list.

🍓 FTP LOCATION 🍓

ftp://ftp.comtrol.com/

okay that’s the whole page — signed with (c) Comtrol Corp. copyright energy and dated 19 August 2009, it’s nslinkrelease(8) signing off 💅✨

📦 where this page comes from