Notes on connecting a Best Fortress UPS to a NeXT serial port:

Hardware:
  The correct cable wiring is as follows:
      UPS (DB-9 male)      NeXT (Mini DIN-8 male)
      ---------------      ----------------------
           1                      3
           2                      5
           4                      4

Software for graceful shutdown:
  The CheckUPS for Unix software package from Best includes a BSD Unix
  version called checkups.bsd.  I got the floppy disk version of this
  software; the 3.5 inch DOS-format floppy that comes in this package
  reads fine on the NeXT.  To compile the file, you not only have to
  rename it to checkups.c, but also change carriage-return line-feed
  endings to just line-feed (i.e. newline).  Here's how I got the
  program off the disk, changed the line ending convention and name,
  and compiled it:
    tr -d '\015' < /DOS/checkups.bsd > checkups.c
    cc -bsd -o checkups checkups.c               
  This compiles like a charm, without so much as a warning. As far as
  I can tell from looking at it, it should run fine in its as-is
  state.  However, I have only actually tested it after making two
  minor modifications:
    1) I changed it to directly run "/usr/etc/halt -p" to shut the
       system down rather than an /etc/upsdown script that would
       presumably contain this line.  This is a matter of taste and
       I'm not convinced I'd recommend it.
    2) I changed the printmsg function to use syslog (at the emergency
       priority level) rather than the wall command to display the
       messages.  The normal /etc/syslog.conf configuration is set up
       so that emergency messages are in fact broadcast to all
       logged-in users, just like with wall.  However, additionally
       the messages wind up on the console and in the log file
       (/usr/adm/messages).  This is useful in our situation, since
       there is typically no one logged in to the file server
       (particularly when the power is out, since nothing they could
       log in from is on an UPS), so the broadcasting would likely
       never be seen, but it is nice to have a record in the log file
       of what happened.

Security:
  If you don't make the protection modes on /dev/ttya more restrictive,
  then any normal user, even logging in remotely, will be able to
  power your machine down by just sending the right string to that
  serial port.  So, I'd recommend making that device accesable only to
  root.  In fact, I'd go further and do the same for all the various
  flow controlled and dial in/out variations on tty, i.e.
  /dev/{tty{d,},cu}{f,}a

Please let me know if you have any additional information (or
corrections, heaven forbid) you would like to contribute to this file.
  -Max Hailperin <max@nic.gac.edu>, Gustavus Adolphus College
