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diff --git a/docs/services.md b/docs/services.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..223cfb5 --- /dev/null +++ b/docs/services.md @@ -0,0 +1,110 @@ +# Service Files + +Services that can be started and managed by init are described by service +description files stored in `/usr/share/init`. + +The init process actually reads from `/etc/init.d` which contains symlinks to +the actual service files. + +Enabling a service means adding a symlink, disabling means removing a symlink. + +Service descriptions can be parameterized. The arguments are extracted from the +name of the symlink. Currently only 1 parameter is supported. The argument +value is separated from the service name by an '@' character in the symlink +name. + + + +Below is an annotated example for a simple, service description for a +generic, parameterized agetty service: + + # + # The text that init should print out when the status of the + # service changes. + # + # The '%0' is replaced with the first argument extracted from the + # symlink name. + # + description "agetty on %0" + + # + # How to run the service. 'respawn' means restart the service when it + # terminates, 'once' means run it only once and continue with other + # services in the mean while, 'wait' means run it once, but block until + # it exits. + # + type respawn + + # + # When to start the service. 'boot' means when booting the system. Other + # options are 'reboot', 'shutdown' and 'ctrlaltdel'. The system always + # starts into the 'boot' target and then later transitions to one of the + # others. + # + target boot + + # + # A list of service names that must be started before this service can + # be run, i.e. this services needs to be started after those. + # + # This can only refer to generic names, not specific instances. For + # instance, you can say "after getty" to make sure a service comes up after + # all gettys are started, but you cannot specify "after agetty@tty1". + # + # Similar to 'after', there is also a 'before' keyword for specifying + # dependencies. + # + after sysinit + + # + # The 'tty' directive specifies a file to which all I/O of the process is + # redirected. The specified device file is used as a controlling tty for + # the process and a new session is created with the service process as + # session leader. + # + # In this example, we derive the controlling tty from the service + # description argument. + # + tty "/dev/%0" + + # + # The 'exec' directive specifies the command to execute in order to start + # the service. See in the example below on how to run multiple commands. + # + # Again we use the argument to specify what terminal our getty + # should run on. + # + exec agetty %0 linux + +As can be seen in this simple example, each line in a service description is +made up of a keyword, followed by one or more arguments and terminated by a +line break. + +Blank lines are ignored and shell-style comments can be used. + +Arguments are separated by space. Quotation marks can be used to treat +something containing spaces or comment character as a single argument. + +In between quotation marks, C-style escape sequences can be used. + +Argument substitution (arguments derived from the symlink name) can be +done using a '%' sign, followed by the argument index. A '%' sign can be +escaped by writing '%%'. + + +If a service should sequentially run multiple commands, they can be grouped +inside braces as can be seen in the following, abbreviated example: + + description "mount /var" + type wait + target boot + before vfs + exec { + mount -t tmpfs none /var + mkdir /var/log -m 0755 + mkdir /var/spool -m 0755 + mkdir /var/lib -m 0755 + mkdir /var/tmp -m 0755 + mount --bind /cfg/preserve/var_lib /var/lib + } + |