diff -urN ./plugins/check_nt.c ../plugins/plugins/check_nt.c
--- ./plugins/check_nt.c	2005-01-24 08:29:53.000000000 +0100
+++ ../plugins/plugins/check_nt.c	2005-02-17 12:26:57.000000000 +0100
@@ -35,6 +35,9 @@
 const char *copyright = "2003-2004";
 const char *email = "nagiosplug-devel@lists.sourceforge.net";
 
+extern const char *status_strings;
+extern int timeout_status;
+
 #include "common.h"
 #include "netutils.h"
 #include "utils.h"
@@ -454,6 +457,7 @@
 		{"hostname", required_argument,0,'H'},
 		{"version",  no_argument,      0,'V'},
 		{"help",     no_argument,      0,'h'},
+		{"timeout-status", required_argument, 0, 'T'},
 		{0,0,0,0}
 	};
 
@@ -478,7 +482,7 @@
 	}
 
 	while (1){
-		c = getopt_long(argc,argv,"+hVH:t:c:w:p:v:l:s:d:",longopts,&option);
+		c = getopt_long(argc,argv,"+hVH:t:c:w:p:v:l:s:d:T:",longopts,&option);
 
 		if (c==-1||c==EOF||c==1)
 			break;
@@ -549,8 +553,11 @@
 				socket_timeout=atoi(optarg);
 				if(socket_timeout<=0)
 					return ERROR;
+				break;
+			case 'T':
+				if(set_timeout_status(optarg) == ERROR) return ERROR;
+				break;
 			}
-
 	}
 
 	if (vars_to_check==CHECK_NONE)
diff -urN ./plugins/common.h ../plugins/plugins/common.h
--- ./plugins/common.h	2004-12-10 11:42:00.000000000 +0100
+++ ../plugins/plugins/common.h	2005-02-17 12:26:57.000000000 +0100
@@ -157,8 +157,13 @@
 	ERROR = -1
 };
 
-/* AIX seems to have this defined somewhere else */
-#ifndef FALSE
+/* AIX seems to have FALSE defined somewhere else, so make sure
+ * TRUE means something else (we assume it does if it's already defined) */
+#ifdef FALSE
+# ifndef TRUE
+#  define TRUE (FALSE ^ 1)
+# endif
+#else
 enum {
 	FALSE,
 	TRUE
@@ -170,7 +175,8 @@
 	STATE_WARNING,
 	STATE_CRITICAL,
 	STATE_UNKNOWN,
-	STATE_DEPENDENT
+	STATE_DEPENDENT,
+	STATE_OOB           /* result out of bounds (keep last in list!) */
 };
 
 enum {
diff -urN ./plugins/netutils.c ../plugins/plugins/netutils.c
--- ./plugins/netutils.c	2005-01-05 21:53:22.000000000 +0100
+++ ../plugins/plugins/netutils.c	2005-02-17 12:34:23.000000000 +0100
@@ -38,18 +38,23 @@
 int econn_refuse_state = STATE_CRITICAL;
 int was_refused = FALSE;
 int address_family = AF_UNSPEC;
+extern char *status_strings;
+extern int timeout_status;
 
 static int my_connect(const char *address, int port, int *sd, int proto);
 /* handles socket timeouts */
 void
 socket_timeout_alarm_handler (int sig)
 {
-	if (sig == SIGALRM)
-		printf (_("CRITICAL - Socket timeout after %d seconds\n"), socket_timeout);
-	else
-		printf (_("CRITICAL - Abnormal timeout after %d seconds\n"), socket_timeout);
+	/* this can only happen with poorly written plugins, so chalk
+	 * it up as input validation error and return STATE_UNKNOWN */
+	if(timeout_status < 0 || timeout_status >= STATE_OOB)
+		timeout_status = STATE_UNKNOWN;
 
-	exit (STATE_CRITICAL);
+	printf (_("%s - Socket timeout after %d seconds\n"),
+	          status_strings[timeout_status], socket_timeout);
+
+	exit (timeout_status);
 }
 
 
diff -urN ./plugins/utils.c ../plugins/plugins/utils.c
--- ./plugins/utils.c	2005-01-05 21:53:23.000000000 +0100
+++ ../plugins/plugins/utils.c	2005-02-17 12:26:57.000000000 +0100
@@ -23,6 +23,20 @@
 extern void print_usage (void);
 extern const char *progname;
 
+/* NULL-terminate these arrays just to be prudent
+ * It's a bit faster and a lot more portable to use two separate
+ * arrays for this, as we don't need to rely on strcasecmp being available
+ */
+const char *status_strings[] = {
+	"OK", "WARNING", "CRITICAL", "UNKNOWN", "DEPENDENT", NULL
+};
+const char *lowercase_status_strings[] = {
+	"ok", "warning", "critical", "unknown", "dependent", NULL
+};
+/* plugins may set this themselves, so export it from here
+ * and have the plugins import it explicitly as extern */
+int timeout_status = STATE_CRITICAL;
+
 #define STRLEN 64
 #define TXTBLK 128
 
@@ -105,18 +119,10 @@
 const char *
 state_text (int result)
 {
-	switch (result) {
-	case STATE_OK:
-		return "OK";
-	case STATE_WARNING:
-		return "WARNING";
-	case STATE_CRITICAL:
-		return "CRITICAL";
-	case STATE_DEPENDENT:
-		return "DEPENDENT";
-	default:
+	if(result < 0 || result >= STATE_OOB)
 		return "UNKNOWN";
-	}
+
+	return status_strings[result];
 }
 
 void
@@ -129,14 +135,54 @@
 	exit (result);
 }
 
+int
+set_timeout_status(const char *arg)
+{
+	int i;
+	
+	timeou_status = -1;
+	for(i = 0; status_strings[i],lowercase_status_strings[i]; i++) {
+		if(status_strings[i][0] = arg[0] ||
+		   lowercase_status_strings[i][0] = arg[0])
+		{
+			timeout_status = i;
+			break;
+		}
+
+		if(timeout_status != -1) return OK;
+
+		errno = 0;
+		timeout_status = (int)strtol(arg, NULL, 0);
+		if(timeout_status < STATE_OK || timeout_status >= STATE_OOB ||
+		   (!timeout_status && errno))
+		{
+			timeout_status = STATE_UNKNOWN;
+			return ERROR;
+		}
+	}
+
+	return OK;
+}
+
+
 void
 timeout_alarm_handler (int signo)
 {
+	/* don't segfault if someone stupid has set this arbitrarily */
+	if(timeout_status < 0 || timeout_status >= STATE_OOB)
+		timeout_status = STATE_UNKNOWN;
+
 	if (signo == SIGALRM) {
-		printf (_("CRITICAL - Plugin timed out after %d seconds\n"),
-						timeout_interval);
-		exit (STATE_CRITICAL);
+		printf (_("%s - Plugin timed out after %d seconds\n"),
+						status_strings[timeout_status], timeout_interval);
+		exit (timeout_status);
 	}
+
+	/* fallthrough so we print something in case some stupid plugin
+	 * contributor has set this function to the catch-all sighandler */
+	printf(_("Caught signal %d in timeout_alarm_handler (bad coding).\n"),
+		signo);
+	exit(STATE_UNKNOWN);
 }
 
 int