linuxshellinit.dstart-stop-daemon

What is start-stop-daemon in linux scripting?


What is start-stop-daemon and how should it be used?

I am trying to automate a particular program to run. Whenever the system starts, the program should run. For that I am writing script in /etc/init.d/ location.


Solution

  • It is a program to manage the start and stop of system level background processes (daemons). You use it by passing in parameters (such as the pid file to create/check) and command arguments for the process you want to launch.

    Then, you do one of two things:

    start-stop-daemon -S [other arguments] something

    start something, if something wasn't already running. If it was running, do nothing.

    start-stop-daemon -K [other arguments] something

    stop something. If something wasn't running, do nothing.

    The man page provides more information on the various arguments. Typically a template is provided in /etc/init.d/ which has other commands for the init process that controls the running of background processes.


    What does it mean?

    start-stop-daemon --start --background -m --oknodo --pidfile ${PIDFILE} --exec ${DAEMON} -- ${TARGETDIR}