Support data collection

doc/ChangeLog.md

@@ -15,6 +15,10 @@ All notable changes to the project are documented in this file.
 
 ### Changes
 
+- New `support` command for collecting system diagnostics to aid in both
+  troubleshooting and support.  Run `support collect > data.tar.gz`
+  locally or remotely via SSH to gather configuration, logs, network state,
+  and system information
 - Upgrade Buildroot to 2025.02.8 (LTS)
 - Upgrade Linux kernel to 6.12.59 (LTS)
 - Initial support for 32-bit ARM systems, reference board: Raspberry Pi 2B

doc/system.md

@@ -323,6 +323,94 @@ reference ID, stratum, time offsets, frequency, and root delay.
 > The system uses `chronyd` Network Time Protocol (NTP) daemon.  The
 > output shown here is best explained in the [Chrony documentation][4].
 
+## Support Data Collection
+
+When troubleshooting issues or seeking support, the `support` command
+provides a convenient way to collect comprehensive system diagnostics.
+This command gathers configuration files, logs, network state, and other
+system information into a single compressed archive.
+
+### Collecting Support Data
+
+To collect support data and save it to a file:
+
+```bash
+admin@host:~$ support collect > support-data.tar.gz
+(admin@host) Password: ***********
+Starting support data collection from host...
+This may take up to a minute. Please wait...
+Tailing /var/log/messages for 30 seconds (please wait)...
+Log tail complete.
+Collection complete. Creating archive...
+admin@host:~$ ls -l support-data.tar.gz
+-rw-rw-r-- 1 admin admin 508362 nov 30 13:05 support-data.tar.gz
+```
+
+The command can also be run remotely via SSH from your workstation:
+
+```bash
+$ ssh admin@host support collect > support-data.tar.gz
+...
+```
+
+The collection process may take up to a minute depending on system load
+and the amount of logging data. Progress messages are shown during the
+collection process.
+
+### Encrypted Collection
+
+For secure transmission of support data, the archive can be encrypted
+with GPG using a password:
+
+```bash
+admin@host:~$ support collect -p mypassword > support-data.tar.gz.gpg
+Starting support data collection from host...
+This may take up to a minute. Please wait...
+...
+Collection complete. Creating archive...
+Encrypting with GPG...
+```
+
+The `support collect` command even supports omitting `mypassword` and
+will then prompt interactively for the password.  This works over SSH too,
+but the local ssh client may then echo the password.
+
+> [!TIP]
+> To hide the encryption password for an SSH session, the script supports reading from stdin:  
+> `echo "$MYSECRET" | ssh user@device support collect -p > file.tar.gz.gpg`
+
+After transferring the resulting file to your workstation, decrypt it
+with the password:
+
+```bash
+$ gpg -d support-data.tar.gz.gpg > support-data.tar.gz
+$ tar xzf support-data.tar.gz
+```
+
+or
+
+```bash
+$ gpg -d support-data.tar.gz.gpg | tar xz
+```
+
+> [!IMPORTANT]
+> Make sure to share `mypassword` out-of-band from the encrypted data
+> with the recipient of the data.  I.e., avoid sending both in the same
+> plain-text email for example.
+
+### What is Collected
+
+The support archive includes:
+
+ - System identification (hostname, uptime, kernel version)
+ - Running and operational configuration (sysrepo datastores)
+ - System logs (`/var/log` directory and live tail of messages log)
+ - Network configuration and state (interfaces, routes, neighbors, bridges)
+ - FRRouting information (OSPF, BFD status)
+ - Container information (podman containers and their configuration)
+ - System resource usage (CPU, memory, disk, processes)
+ - Hardware information (PCI, USB devices, network interfaces)
+
 [1]: https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc7317
 [2]: https://github.com/kernelkit/infix/blob/main/src/confd/yang/infix-system%402024-02-29.yang
 [3]: https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc8341

src/bin/Makefile.am

@@ -2,6 +2,7 @@ DISTCLEANFILES   = *~ *.d
 ACLOCAL_AMFLAGS  = -I m4
 
 bin_PROGRAMS     = copy erase files
+sbin_SCRIPTS     = support
 
 # Bash completion
 bashcompdir      = $(datadir)/bash-completion/completions