Setup apcupsd and netdata on Ubuntu

In this document, I will explain how to setup apcupsd on Ubuntu 18.04 and 20.04.

I'll only document USB connected UPS and not the other supported connection modes.

Remove nut

If you have followed my previous gist related to nut, I'd serisouly recommend you to cleanup everything before continuing this gist.

# Remove the main 'nut' package
sudo apt remove --purge -y nut

# Mode to the generated 'nut' deb packages folder
cd ~/nut-274-debs/

# Create a loop that gather package basenames only and remove them
for D in *.*deb ; do sudo apt remove --purge -y $(echo $D | sed -e 's/_2.7.4-11ubuntu4_all.*deb//' | sed -e 's/_2.7.4-11ubuntu4_amd64.*deb//') ; done

# Remove any left dependent and now orphan packages
sudo apt autoremove --purge -y

Install required dependencies

Apcupsd

sudo apt install apcupsd

Netdata

If you have followed my previous gist related to nut, you might have it already installed but if not, simply run this command to install netdata:

bash <(curl -Ss https://my-netdata.io/kickstart.sh) all --dont-wait --disable-telemetry

Must read

I'd also recommend you to take the time to explore the PDF manual that contains tons of useful information about how to implement and configure apcupsd.

You can find the HTML manual here if you prefer.

Configure UPS connection

It seems like almost everything has been already configured during the installation process of apcupsd but if when running apcaccess you get a similar status:

STATUS   : COMMLOST

Then you might need to patch the /etc/apcupsd/apcupsd.conf file that way:

# Remove the unnecessary assigned USB device port
sudo sed -e 's|DEVICE /dev/ttyS0|DEVICE|' -i /etc/apcupsd/apcupsd.conf

# Restart the service
sudo systemctl restart apcupsd.service ; systemctl status apcupsd.service -l

You should now get a similar output when running apcaccess:

$ apcaccess
APC      : 001,036,0880
DATE     : 2021-07-03 19:40:00 +0200  
HOSTNAME : [REDACTED]
VERSION  : 3.14.14 (31 May 2016) debian
UPSNAME  : [REDACTED]
CABLE    : USB Cable
DRIVER   : USB UPS Driver
UPSMODE  : Stand Alone
STARTTIME: 2021-07-03 18:34:46 +0200  
MODEL    : Back-UPS XS 1400U  
STATUS   : ONLINE 
LINEV    : 236.0 Volts
LOADPCT  : 19.0 Percent
BCHARGE  : 100.0 Percent
TIMELEFT : 33.1 Minutes
MBATTCHG : 5 Percent
MINTIMEL : 3 Minutes
MAXTIME  : 0 Seconds
SENSE    : Medium
LOTRANS  : 155.0 Volts
HITRANS  : 280.0 Volts
ALARMDEL : 30 Seconds
BATTV    : 27.2 Volts
LASTXFER : Unacceptable line voltage changes
NUMXFERS : 0
TONBATT  : 0 Seconds
CUMONBATT: 0 Seconds
XOFFBATT : N/A
SELFTEST : NO
STATFLAG : 0x05000008
SERIALNO : [REDACTED]  
BATTDATE : 2020-09-17
NOMINV   : 230 Volts
NOMBATTV : 24.0 Volts
NOMPOWER : 700 Watts
FIRMWARE : 926.T2 .I USB FW:T2
END APC  : 2021-07-03 19:40:00 +0200

Configure Netdata

As you might have seen if you've following my previous gist related to nut, the configuration for apcupsd is much more simpler 😅

You can now configure Netdata and add the name of your UPS in the configuration file:

# Go to the netdata config folder
cd /etc/netdata

# Run the editing script
sudo ./edit-config charts.d/apcupsd.conf

You don't really need to change anything as normally the defaults are good enough to simply having to restart the service and nothing more:

sudo systemctl restart netdata ; systemctl status netdata -l

Now you can navigate to http://localhost:19999 and search for the UPS section on the right, you should see something like that:

Jiab77/setup-apcupsd-and-netdata-on-ubuntu.md