setup a watchdog which triggers a kernel panic if the script gets stuck

dead-man-switch.sh

#!/bin/bash

KERNEL_MODULE=softdog
WATCHDOG_DEVICE=/dev/watchdog
LOGFILE=/deadmancheck.log
WATCHDOG_TIMEOUT=30
SLEEPTIMER=3

####

lsmod | grep ${KERNEL_MODULE} || modprobe ${KERNEL_MODULE} soft_panic=1 soft_margin=${WATCHDOG_TIMEOUT}

while true;
do
    touch ${WATCHDOG_DEVICE}
    date | tee ${LOGFILE}
    sleep ${SLEEPTIMER}
done

# INFO: disable watchdog by running:
# echo V > ${WATCHDOG_DEVICE}