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START-STOP-DAEMON

Section: Maintenance Commands (8)
Updated: SMM
Index Return to Main Contents

BSD mandoc
OpenRC

NAME

start-stop-daemon - ensures that daemons start and stop

SYNOPSIS

-S , -start daemon [- ] [arguments ]
-K , -stop daemon
-s , -signal signal daemon

DESCRIPTION

provides a consistent method of starting, stopping and signaling daemons. If neither -K , -stop nor -s , -signal are provided, then we assume we are starting the daemon. If a daemon cannot background by itself, nor create a pidfile, can do it for the daemon in a secure fashion.

If is used in an OpenRC service, then OpenRC can in turn check to see if the daemon is still running. If not, then the service is marked as crashed.

Here are the options to specify the daemon and how it should start or stop:

-x , -exec daemon: The daemon we start or stop. If this option is not specified, then the first non option argument is used.
-p , -pidfile pidfile: When starting, we expect the daemon to create a valid pidfile within a reasonable amount of time. When stopping we only stop the first pid listed in the pidfile
-n , -name name: Match the process name instead of a pidfile or executable.
-i , -interpreted: When matching process name, we should ensure that the correct interpreter is also matched. So if the daemon foo starts off like so then matches the process If an interpreted daemon changes its process name then this won't work.
-u , -user user [: group ]: Start the daemon as the user and update $HOME accordingly or stop daemons owned by the user. You can optionally append a group name here also.
-t , -test: Print the action(s) that would be taken, but don't actually do anything. The return value is set as if the command was taken and worked.
-v , -verbose: Print the action(s) that are taken just before doing them.
-q , -quiet: Run quietly (repeat to suppress errors).
-P , -progress: Echo a . to the console for each second elapsed whilst waiting.

These options are only used for starting daemons:

-a , -startas name: Change the process name of the daemon to name This just changes the first argument passed to the daemon.
-b , -background: Force the daemon into the background. Some daemons don't create pidfiles, so a good trick is to get the daemon to run in the foreground, and use the this option along with -m , -make-pidfile to create a working pidfile.
-d , -chdir path: chdir to this directory before starting the daemon.
-r , -chroot path: chroot to this directory before starting the daemon. All other paths, such as the path to the daemon, chdir and pidfile, should be relative to the chroot.
-c , -chuid user: Same as the -u , -user option.
-e , -env VAR=VALUE: Set the environment variable VAR to VALUE.
-g , -group group: Start the daemon as in the group.
-k , -umask mode: Set the umask of the daemon.
--notify fd: num | socket:ready: Open file descriptor num as a pipe, and waits until the daemon writes a newline to it before exiting. Or waits for READY=1 in the datagram socket opened at $NOTIFY_SOCKET
-m , -make-pidfile: Saves the pid of the daemon in the file specified by the -p , -pidfile option. Only useful when used with daemons that run in the foreground and forced into the background with the -b , -background option.
-I , -ionice class [: data ]: Modifies the IO scheduling priority of the daemon. Class can be 0 for none, 1 for real time, 2 for best effort and 3 for idle. Data can be from 0 to 7 inclusive.
-N , -nicelevel level: Modifies the scheduling priority of the daemon.
--oom-score-adj adj: Modifies the OOM score adjustment of the daemon.
--scheduler policy: Sets the scheduling policy of the daemon. Possible values are other, fifo and rr on POSIX systems and, additionally, batch and idle on Linux. If policy is an integer, it is passed directly to pthread_setschedparam(3).
--scheduler-priority priority: Sets the priority parameter of the scheduling policy of the daemon. See sched(7) for details.
-0 , -stdin file: Redirect the standard input of the process to file when started with -background The file Must be an absolute pathname, but relative to the path optionally given with -r , -chroot The file can also be a named pipe. The file must exist, otherwise an error is emitted.
-1 , -stdout logfile: Redirect the standard output of the process to logfile when started with -background The logfile Must be an absolute pathname, but relative to the path optionally given with -r , -chroot The logfile can also be a named pipe.
-2 , -stderr logfile: Redirect the standard error of the process to logfile when started with -background The logfile must be an absolute pathname, but relative to the path optionally given with -r , -chroot The logfile can also be a named pipe.
-3 , -stdout-logger cmd: Run cmd as a child process redirecting the standard output to the standard input of cmd when started with -background Cmd must be an absolute pathname, but relative to the path optionally given with -r , -chroot This process must be prepared to accept input on stdin and be able to log it or send it to another location.
-4 , -stderr-logger cmd: Run cmd as a child process and Redirect the standard error of the process to the standard input of cmd when started with -background Cmd must be an absolute pathname, but relative to the path optionally given with -r , -chroot This process must be prepared to accept input on stdin and be able to log it or send it to another location.
--capabilities cap-list: Start the daemon with the listed inheritable, ambient and bounding capabilities. The format is the same as in cap_iab(3).
--secbits sec-bits: Set the security-bits for the program. The numeric value of the security-bits can be found in <sys/secbits.h> header file. The format is the same as in strtoul(3).
--no-new-privs: Set the No New Privs flag for the program. See PR_SET_NO_NEW_PRIVS prctl(2).
-w , -wait milliseconds: Wait milliseconds after starting and check that daemon is still running. Useful for daemons that check configuration after forking or stopping race conditions where the pidfile is written out after forking.

These options are only used for stopping daemons:

-R , -retry timeout | signal / timeout: The retry specification can be either a timeout in seconds or multiple signal/timeout pairs (like SIGTERM/5). If this option is not given, the default is SIGTERM/5.

ENVIRONMENT

SSD_IONICELEVEL can also set the IO scheduling priority of the daemon, but the command line option takes precedence.

SSD_NICELEVEL can also set the scheduling priority of the daemon, but the command line option takes precedence.

SSD_OOM_SCORE_ADJ can also set the OOM score adjustment of the daemon, but the command line option takes precedence.

SSD_STARTWAIT As the -w , -wait option above. /etc/rc.conf waits for to check the daemon is still running.

NOTE

uses getopt(3) to parse its options, which allows it to accept the `--' option which will cause it to stop processing options at that point. Any subsequent arguments are passed as arguments to the daemon to start and used when finding a daemon to stop or signal.