quiet_smart - SMART Drive Monitor

A Python application that monitors SSD/NVMe drives for health changes and sends persistent desktop notifications when issues are detected.

Features

• Automated Monitoring: Daily cron job monitors drive health
• Persistent Notifications: Critical alerts remain visible until dismissed
• Detailed Reports: Human-readable reports with drive metrics and changes
• Test Mode: Simulate changes to test notification system
• State Tracking: JSON-based state persistence for change detection
• Multi-Drive Support: Monitors all non-USB drives (SATA SSD + NVMe)

Installation

1. Clone/Copy to desired directory
2. Install dependencies:

   python3 -m venv venv
   source venv/bin/activate
   pip install -r requirements.txt

3. Ensure smartmontools is installed:

   sudo apt install smartmontools libnotify-bin

Usage Examples

Basic Monitoring

# Run monitoring once
python3 quiet_smart.py

# Use virtual environment
./venv/bin/python quiet_smart.py

Cron Job Management

# Install daily cron job (9 AM)
python3 quiet_smart.py -c

# Remove cron job
python3 quiet_smart.py -d

# Verify cron job installation
crontab -l | grep quiet_smart

Test Mode

# Simulate changes (all metrics appear to change from -1)
python3 quiet_smart.py --test

Monitored Metrics

Warning Triggers (Generate Notifications)

• Reallocated Sectors: Any increase
• Media/Data Integrity Errors: Any increase
• Critical Warning: Any non-zero value
• Available Spare %: Any decrease
• Warning/Critical Temperature Time: Any increase
• Unsafe Shutdowns: Any increase

Tracked Information

• Power On Hours
• Power Cycles
• Temperature
• Drive Model/Serial
• Capacity
• Health Status

File Structure

quiet_smart/
├── quiet_smart.py          # Main application
├── requirements.txt        # Python dependencies
├── architecture.md         # Technical documentation
├── README.md              # This file
├── state.json             # Previous run metrics (auto-generated)
├── report_YYYYMMDD_HHMM.txt # Reports (auto-generated)
├── cron.log              # Cron job output (auto-generated)
├── backup/               # Code backups
│   └── quiet_smart.YYYYMMDD.py
└── venv/                 # Virtual environment

Example Report Output

=== SMART Drive Report - 2025-10-01 12:33:20 ===

=== Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 500GB (sda) ===
Serial: S33DNX0HC03586A
Capacity: 465 GB
Power On Hours: 21420
Power Cycles: 1891
Reallocated Sectors: 0
Temperature: 30°C
Available Spare %: 100
Unsafe Shutdowns: 0
Media/Data Integrity Errors: 0
Health: Excellent

Notification Examples

When issues are detected, persistent notifications appear:

• "Drive /dev/sda: Reallocated Sectors increased from 0 to 1 (∞% change)"
• "Drive /dev/nvme0n1: Unsafe Shutdowns increased from 77 to 85 (10.4% change)"
• "Drive /dev/sdb: Available Spare decreased from 100% to 98% (-2.0% change)"

Requirements

• Linux: Ubuntu/Debian-based distribution
• Python: 3.6+
• System Packages: smartmontools, libnotify-bin
• Python Packages: python-crontab
• Permissions: sudo access for smartctl commands
• Desktop: GUI environment for notifications

Troubleshooting

No notifications appearing

• Install notification system: sudo apt install libnotify-bin
• Ensure desktop environment is running

Permission errors

• Add user to sudoers for smartctl: sudo visudo
• Add line: username ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: /usr/sbin/smartctl

Cron job not running

• Check cron service: sudo systemctl status cron
• Verify job installation: crontab -l
• Check log file: tail -f cron.log

License

This project follows user preferences for coding style including spaces in function calls and semicolons.