Run as Service/Daemon

Warning

This section has not been updated since v.3.2. Bots in the current version may operate differently than described below.

After Bots installation nothing is runnng in the background (service in Windows or daemon in Linux/Unix). Bots has several parts that you may want to run as services/daemons:

• bots-webserver.py

• bots-jobqueueserver.py (if you use this)

• bots-dirmonitor.py (if you use this)

Note

bots-engine is scheduled, it is not a daemon/service.

Windows Services

2 ways to use bots as a service (after Python and bots are installed):

1. Official way, using sc.exe or srvany.exe. It’s the Microsoft way. (I never use this myself).

2. Much simpler is to use NSSM

Note

I mostly use the Task Scheduler, option ‘begin the task’ set to value ‘at start-up’. Simple, works fine for me.

Linux Daemons

Note

I mostly use cron to start up at boot (@reboot). Simple, works fine for me.

Below are some examples that run bots-webserver or jobqueserver as a daemon:

Example 1 systemd

(google it, quite simple)

Example 2 SysV init using start-stop-daemon

#! /bin/sh
#
# uses 'start-stop-daemon' , which is used in debian/ubuntu
#
NAME=bots-webserver
PIDFILE="/var/run/$NAME.pid"
DAEMON="/usr/local/bin/bots-webserver.py"
DAEMON_ARGS="-cconfig"

case "$1" in
    start)
        echo "Starting "$NAME" "
        start-stop-daemon --start --verbose --background --pidfile $PIDFILE --make-pidfile --startas $DAEMON -- $DAEMON_ARGS
        ;;
    stop)
        echo "Stopping "$NAME" "
        start-stop-daemon --stop --verbose --pidfile $PIDFILE
        rm -f $PIDFILE
        ;;
    restart)
        echo "Restarting "$NAME" "
        start-stop-daemon --stop --verbose --pidfile $PIDFILE
        rm -f $PIDFILE
        sleep 1
        start-stop-daemon --start --verbose --background --pidfile $PIDFILE --make-pidfile --startas $DAEMON -- $DAEMON_ARGS
        ;;
    \*)
        echo "Usage: ""$(basename "$0")"" {start|stop|restart}"
        echo "    Starts the bots webserver as a daemon."
        echo "    Bots-webserver is part of bots open source edi translator (https://bots-edi.org)."
        exit 1
        ;;
esac

exit 0

Example 2 SysV init

### BEGIN INIT INFO
# Provides:          bots-webserver
# Required-Start:    $remote_fs $network
# Required-Stop:     $remote_fs $network
# Default-Start:     2 3 4 5
# Default-Stop:      0 1 6
# Short-Description: BOTS webserver daemon
# Description:       BOTS webserver daemon
### END INIT INFO

# Using the lsb functions to perform the operations.
. /lib/lsb/init-functions
# Process name ( For display )
NAME=bots-webserver
# Daemon name, where is the actual executable
DAEMON=/usr/bin/bots-webserver.py
# pid file for the daemon
PIDFILE=/var/run/bots-webserver.pid
# Arguments for the daemon
ARGS="> /dev/null 2>&1 &"

# If the daemon is not there, then exit.
test -x $DAEMON || exit 5

case $1 in
 start)
  # Checked the PID file exists and check the actual status of process
  if [ -e $PIDFILE ]; then
   pidofproc -p $PIDFILE $DAEMON && status="0" || status="$?"
   # If the status is SUCCESS then don't need to start again.
   if [ $status = "0" ]; then
    log_success_msg "$NAME process is already running"
    exit # Exit
   fi
  fi
  # Start the daemon.
  # Start the daemon with the help of start-stop-daemon
  # Log the message appropriately
  if start_daemon -p $PIDFILE $DAEMON $ARGS; then
   # For older LSB functions that don't handle -p argument correctly (i.e. CentOS)
   if [ ! -e $PIDFILE ]; then
    pidofproc $DAEMON > $PIDFILE
   fi
   log_success_msg "Starting the process $NAME"
  else
   log_failure_msg "Failed to start the process $NAME"
  fi
  ;;
 stop)
  # Stop the daemon.
  if [ -e $PIDFILE ]; then
   pidofproc -p $PIDFILE $DAEMON > /dev/null && status="0" || status="$?"
   if [ "$status" = 0 ]; then
    killproc -p $PIDFILE $DAEMON
    /bin/rm -f $PIDFILE
    log_success_msg "Stoppping the $NAME process"
   fi
  else
   log_warning_msg "$NAME process is not running"
  fi
  ;;
 restart)
  # Restart the daemon.
  $0 stop && sleep 2 && $0 start
  ;;
 status)
  # Check the status of the process.
  if [ -e $PIDFILE ]; then
   pidofproc -p $PIDFILE $DAEMON > /dev/null && log_success_msg "$NAME process is running" && exit 0 || exit $?
  else
   log_warning_msg "$NAME process is not running"
  fi
  ;;
 reload)
  # Reload the process. Basically sending some signal to a daemon to reload
  # it configurations.
  if [ -e $PIDFILE ]; then
   killproc -p $PIDFILE $DAEMON -signal USR1
   log_success_msg "$NAME process reloaded successfully"
  else
   log_failure_msg "$PIDFILE does not exists"
  fi
  ;;
 \*)
  # For invalid arguments, print the usage message.
  echo "Usage: $0 {start|stop|restart|reload|status}"
  exit 2
  ;;
esac

Example 4 upstart (Ubuntu)

description "bots web server"
author "bots@yourmail.com"

start on runlevel [2345]
stop on runlevel [!2345]

respawn

exec bots-webserver.py