The following timing control parameters apply :-

The timeout and recover parameters do not apply to manually set profiles (see Section 9.2.4) and those based on time-of-day (see Section 9.2.2.2).

The tests described in the previous section are used to form an overall test result. Normally this overall result is used to determine the profile state using the mapping Pass > Active and Fail > Inactive. By setting the invert attribute to true, the overall result is inverted (Pass changed to Fail and vice-versa) first before applying the mapping.

You can manually override all tests, and force the profile state using the set attribute - a value of true forces the state to Active, and false forces it to Inactive.

You can also configure the set attribute with a value of control-switch. This causes the profile to be set manually based on a control switch which is not stored in the configuration itself. The switch appears on the home web page allowing it to be turned on or off with one click. It can also be changed from the command line. You can restrict each switch to one or more specific users to define who has control of the switch. This control applies even if the user has no access to make configuration changes as the switch is not part of the config. The switch state is automatically stored in the dynamic peristent data (along with DHCP settings, etc), so survives a power cycle / restart. The control switch uses initial as the initial state when first added to the config, but at start up it picks up the state of the stored state.

Note that the value of the invert attribute is ignored when manual override is requested.

These fixed-state profiles can be used as simple on/off controls for configuration objects. The following shows an example of two such profiles, expressed in XML :-

<profile name="Off" set="false"/>
<profile name="On" set="true"/>
<profile name="IT-Support"
         comment="Allow IT support company access to server"
	 set="control-switch"/>

As with many things in the FireBrick it is possible to script access to the control pages. The control profiles are a particularly useful example of this as it allows external scripts to control if a profile is active or inactive.

Obviously security is a concern, and it is possible to create a user allowed access only from some IP addresses, and even allowed NOBODY level access, but listed as a user allowed to set a specific control profile. This then allows a script using a username and password to control the profile from specific machones.

For example, setting a named profile:-

curl --silent --user name:pass 'http://1.2.3.4/profile?set=profilename'

And unsetting a named profile:-

curl --silent --user name:pass 'http://1.2.3.4/profile?unset=profilename'

The profile settings also include an led setting which is a colour.

If the profile has an expect setting, then the LED will show selected colour if the profile is not in the expected state, otherwise it shows if the profile is active.

If no profiles with have an LED showing, then the status LED shows the default colour (normally green).

If a profile has the LED showing, this replaces the status default colour.

If more than one profile has the LED showing, then the statusLED cycles through the colours once per second (or longer if would be <100ms per profile).