I am trying to run a minecraft server on a remote linux instance.
I would like the instance to start up the server on a screen named serverscreen which is owned by the user named minecraft once the system boots up, and run a stop command to the serverscreen when the instance shuts down. Then, it needs to wait untill the server has stopped before actually shutting down.
I am quite new to linux but I have managed to come up with a few commands that work, but I have issues trying to start and stop the server automatically.
I have tried quite a few things, like creating a .sh script to run on startup with crontab -e #reboot script.sh, or create a file in etc/rc.local with #!/bin/sh sh script.sh, but those methods didn't seem to work properly for me. Also, they do not run un shutdown unfortunately. Therefore, I thought it would be best to create a service file named minecraft.service with the following commands:
[Unit]
Description=Minecraft Server
After=network.target
[Service]
User=minecraft
Nice=5
KillMode=none
SuccessExitStatus=0 1
InaccessibleDirectories=/root /sys /srv /media -/lost+found
NoNewPrivileges=true
WorkingDirectory=/opt/minecraft/server
ReadWriteDirectories=/opt/minecraft/server
#### Command to start the server.
ExecStart=sudo -u minecraft screen -dmS serverscreen java -Xms6G -Xmx6G -jar /opt/minecraft/server/forgeserver.jar nogui
#### Command to stop the server.
ExecStop=sudo -u minecraft screen -S serverscreen -p 0 -X eval "stuff stop^M"
##### Try to wait untill the server has stopped. I am not sure about this line of code since I haven't been able to test it properly.
ExecStop=/bin/bash -c "while ps -p $MAINPID > /dev/null; do /bin/sleep 1; done"
[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
but when running this, it gives me an error saying that I did not provide an absolute path for something.
Could someone help me setup a service file that will boot up the server on a screen named serverscreen for the user minecraft, and run command stop when the instance shuts down after the server has been stopped?
Thanks to #Riz, the service now works as intended by using a bash script in order to run the commands.
I am getting a Django 1.6 set up started on a Linux (Debian Whiskey) server on Google Compute Engine. I've got Celery 3.1 running in the background to help with some processes. When I start a new instance (using a snapshot I've created), I always need to start Celery. I am looking for a way to start Celery automatically on server-load. This is particularly helpful if the server decides to restart, as they seem to do now and then. To achieve this, I've edited the rc.local file:
$ sudo nano /etc/rc.local
It used to contain the following:
exit 0
[ -x /sbin/initctl ] && initctl emit --no-wait google-rc-local-has-run || true
I've edited the file such that it now reads:
cd /home/user/gce_app celery -A myapp.tasks --concurrency=1 --loglevel=info worker > output.log 2> errors.log &
exit 0
[ -x /sbin/initctl ] && initctl emit --no-wait google-rc-local-has-run || true
The directory:
/home/user/gce_app
is where my Django project resides and the directory I need to be in to start Celery. However, after restarting the instance, when I type in:
$ celery status
Error: No nodes replied within time constraint.
Opening the errors.log file, I see:
/etc/rc.local: 14: /etc/rc.local: celery: not found
Surely the cd at the start of that code string should address this? Is there a way (within the Django project itself) to start the Celery instance when the project is started to make the code more platform-independent and immune to inevitable OS updates?
I think you're missing a semicolon between your 'cd' and celery invocations. Also, I suspect rc.local may not be searching your path, so you may need to give an absolute path to celery. e.g.
cd /home/user/gce_app; /usr/bin/celery ...
Alternatively, you might look at using a startup script from the GCE metadata to avoid needing to modify rc.local.
Since you seem to be using upstart this might help you:
description "runs celery"
start on runlevel [2345]
stop on runlevel [!2345]
console log
env VENV='/srv/myvirtualenv'
env PROJECT='/srv/run/mydjangoproject'
exec su -s /bin/sh -c 'exec "$0" "$#"' www-data -- /usr/bin/env PATH=$VENV:$PATH $VENV/python $PROJECT/manage.py celeryd
respawn
respawn limit 10 5
This is my upstart file /etc/init/myapp.conf on my Ubuntu 12.04.
description "Example of starting Node with Upstart and Forever"
start on filesystem or runlevel [2345]
stop on runlevel [06]
expect fork
console output
setuid lwood
env HOME=/home/lwood
script
cd $HOME
exec forever -a -l /home/lwood/myapp/applog.log \
start /home/lwood/myapp/app.js
end script
pre-stop script
cd $HOME
exec forever stop /home/lwood/myapp/app.js
end script
Do you know why $ sudo restart myapp is only stopping the service? It does not start the service after stopping it. So it has the same effect as $ sudo stop myapp.
Doing $ sudo stop myapp and then $ sudo start myapp works fine though. Wondering why restarting behaves different.
Can you output anything? Output your environment, and specifically your path variable and see if they are different from when you can start it, to when it fails.
When it fails, is there an output file and what is the error?
My guess is that the path is not yet fully set up.
I am using node's forever module to keep my node server running. Forever however terminates when there is a system restart. Is there any way I can automatically start the node server (with forever) when the system restarts?
I would suggest using crontab. It's easy to use.
How to
To start editing run the following replacing the "testuser" with your desired runtime user for the node process. If you choose a different user other than yourself, you will have to run this with sudo.
$ crontab -u testuser -e
If you have never done this before, it will ask you which editor you wish to edit with. I like vim, but will recommend nano for ease of use.
Once in the editor add the following line:
#reboot /usr/local/bin/forever start /your/path/to/your/app.js
Save the file. You should get some feedback that the cron has been installed.
For further confirmation of the installation of the cron, execute the following (again replacing "testuser" with your target username) to list the currently installed crons:
$ crontab -u testuser -l
Note that in my opinion, you should always use full paths when executing binaries in cron.
Also, if the path to your forever script is not correct, run which forever to get the full path.
Given that forever calls node, you may also want to provide the full path to node:
#reboot /usr/local/bin/forever start -c /usr/local/bin/node /your/path/to/your/app.js
Further Reading
crontab Man Page
Ubuntu Cron HowTo
You can use forever-service for doing this.
npm install -g forever-service
forever-service install test
This will provision app.js in the current directory as a service via forever. The service will automatically restart every time system is restarted. Also when stopped it will attempt a graceful stop. This script provisions the logrotate script as well.
Github url: https://github.com/zapty/forever-service
NOTE: I am the author of forever-service.
Install PM2 globally using NPM
npm install pm2 -g
Start your script with pm2
pm2 start app.js
generate an active startup script
pm2 startup
NOTE: pm2 startup is for startting the PM2 when the system reboots. PM2 once started, restarts all the processes it had been managing before the system went down.
In case you want to disable the automatic startup, simply use pm2 unstartup
If you want the startup script to be executed under another user, just use the -u <username> option and the --hp <user_home>:
This case is valid for Debian.
Add the following to /etc/rc.local
/usr/bin/sudo -u {{user}} /usr/local/bin/forever start {{app path}}
{{user}} replaces your username.
{{app path}} replaces your app path. For example, /var/www/test/app.js
An alternative crontab method inspired by this answer and this blog post.
1. Create a bash script file (change bob to desired user).
vi /home/bob/node_server_init.sh
2. Copy and paste this inside the file you've just created.
#!/bin/sh
export NODE_ENV=production
export PATH=/usr/local/bin:$PATH
forever start /node/server/path/server.js > /dev/null
Make sure to edit the paths above according to your config!
3. Make sure the bash script can be executed.
chmod 700 /home/bob/node_server_init.sh
4. Test the bash script.
sh /home/bob/node_server_init.sh
5. Replace "bob" with the runtime user for node.
crontab -u bob -e
6. Copy and paste (change bob to desired user).
#reboot /bin/sh /home/bob/node_server_init.sh
Save the crontab.
You've made it to the end, your prize is a reboot (to test) :)
Copied answer from the attached question.
You can use PM2, it's a production process manager for Node.js applications with a built-in load balancer.
Install PM2
$ npm install pm2 -g
Start an application
$ pm2 start app.js
If you using express then you can start your app like
pm2 start ./bin/www --name="app"
Listing all running processes:
$ pm2 list
It will list all process. You can then stop / restart your service by using ID or Name of the app with following command.
$ pm2 stop all
$ pm2 stop 0
$ pm2 restart all
To display logs
$ pm2 logs ['all'|app_name|app_id]
You need to create a shell script in the /etc/init.d folder for that. It's sort of complicated if you never have done it but there is plenty of information on the web on init.d scripts.
Here is a sample a script that I created to run a CoffeeScript site with forever:
#!/bin/bash
#
# initd-example Node init.d
#
# chkconfig: 345
# description: Script to start a coffee script application through forever
# processname: forever/coffeescript/node
# pidfile: /var/run/forever-initd-hectorcorrea.pid
# logfile: /var/run/forever-initd-hectorcorrea.log
#
# Based on a script posted by https://gist.github.com/jinze at https://gist.github.com/3748766
#
# Source function library.
. /lib/lsb/init-functions
pidFile=/var/run/forever-initd-hectorcorrea.pid
logFile=/var/run/forever-initd-hectorcorrea.log
sourceDir=/home/hectorlinux/website
coffeeFile=app.coffee
scriptId=$sourceDir/$coffeeFile
start() {
echo "Starting $scriptId"
# This is found in the library referenced at the top of the script
start_daemon
# Start our CoffeeScript app through forever
# Notice that we change the PATH because on reboot
# the PATH does not include the path to node.
# Launching forever or coffee with a full path
# does not work unless we set the PATH.
cd $sourceDir
PATH=/usr/local/bin:$PATH
NODE_ENV=production PORT=80 forever start --pidFile $pidFile -l $logFile -a -d --sourceDir $sourceDir/ -c coffee $coffeeFile
RETVAL=$?
}
restart() {
echo -n "Restarting $scriptId"
/usr/local/bin/forever restart $scriptId
RETVAL=$?
}
stop() {
echo -n "Shutting down $scriptId"
/usr/local/bin/forever stop $scriptId
RETVAL=$?
}
status() {
echo -n "Status $scriptId"
/usr/local/bin/forever list
RETVAL=$?
}
case "$1" in
start)
start
;;
stop)
stop
;;
status)
status
;;
restart)
restart
;;
*)
echo "Usage: {start|stop|status|restart}"
exit 1
;;
esac
exit $RETVAL
I had to make sure the folder and PATHs were explicitly set or available to the root user since init.d scripts are ran as root.
Use the PM2
Which is the best option to run the server production server
What are the advantages of running your application this way?
PM2 will automatically restart your application if it crashes.
PM2 will keep a log of your unhandled exceptions - in this case, in a file at /home/safeuser/.pm2/logs/app-err.log.
With one command, PM2 can ensure that any applications it manages restart when the server reboots. Basically, your node application will start as a service.
ref: https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-use-pm2-to-setup-a-node-js-production-environment-on-an-ubuntu-vps
Forever was not made to get node applications running as services. The right approach is to either create an /etc/inittab entry (old linux systems) or an upstart (newer linux systems).
Here's some documentation on how to set this up as an upstart:
https://github.com/cvee/node-upstart
crontab does not work for me on CentOS x86 6.5. #reboot seems to be not working.
Finally I got this solution:
Edit: /etc/rc.local
sudo vi /etc/rc.local
Add this line to the end of the file. Change USER_NAME and PATH_TO_PROJECT to your own. NODE_ENV=production means the app runs in production mode. You can add more lines if you need to run more than one node.js app.
su - USER_NAME -c "NODE_ENV=production /usr/local/bin/forever start /PATH_TO_PROJECT/app.js"
Don't set NODE_ENV in a separate line, your app will still run in development mode, because forever does not get NODE_ENV.
# WRONG!
su - USER_NAME -c "export NODE_ENV=production"
Save and quit vi (press ESC : w q return). You can try rebooting your server. After your server reboots, your node.js app should run automatically, even if you don't log into any account remotely via ssh.
You'd better set NODE_ENV environment in your shell. NODE_ENV will be set automatically when your account USER_NAME logs in.
echo export NODE_ENV=production >> ~/.bash_profile
So you can run commands like forever stop/start /PATH_TO_PROJECT/app.js via ssh without setting NODE_ENV again.
I wrote a script that does exactly this:
https://github.com/chovy/node-startup
I have not tried with forever, but you can customize the command it runs, so it should be straight forward:
/etc/init.d/node-app start
/etc/init.d/node-app restart
/etc/init.d/node-app stop
The problem with rc.local is that the commands are accessed as root which is different than logging to as a user and using sudo.
I solved this problem by adding a .sh script with the startup commands i want to etc/profile.d. Any .sh file in profile.d will load automatically and any command will be treated as if you used the regular sudo.
The only downside to this is the specified user needs to loggin for things to start which in my situation was always the case.
I tried lots of the above answers. None of them worked for me. My app is installed in /home and as user, not as root. This probably means that when the above mentioned start scripts run, /home is not mounted yet, so the app is not started.
Then I found these instructions by Digital Ocean:
https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-use-pm2-to-setup-a-node-js-production-environment-on-an-ubuntu-vps
Using PM2 as explained was very simple and works perfectly: My virtual servers had two physical crashes since - downtime was only about a minute.
complete example crontab (located at /etc/crontab) ..
#!/bin/bash
# edit this file with .. crontab -u root -e
# view this file with .. crontab -u root -l
# put your path here if it differs
PATH=/root/bin:/root/.local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/snap/bin
# * * * * * echo "executes once every minute" > /root/deleteme
#reboot cd /root/bible-api-dbt-server; npm run forever;
#reboot cd /root/database-api-server; npm run forever;
#reboot cd /root/mailer-api-server; npm run forever;
I have found my own solution by using serve & npm as follows:
Install serve package: npm install -g serve
Then have the command serve -s /var/www/sitename to execute on reboot.
This is what works for me on my VPS.
You can use the following command in your shell to start your node forever:
forever app.js //my node script
You need to keep in mind that the server on which your app is running should always be kept on.
I have an Upstart script for my server that looks like this:
description "myapp node.js server"
start on runlevel [2345]
stop on shutdown
env NODE_ENV=production
env CUSTOM=somevalue
exec sudo -u nodejs /usr/local/bin/node /opt/myapp/app.js >> /var/log/nodejs/myapp.log 2>&1
post-start script
NODE_PID=`status myapp | egrep -oi '([0-9]+)$' | head -n1`
echo $NODE_PID > /var/run/nodejs/myapp.pid
end script
However, the app doesn't see NODE_ENV set to production. In fact, if I console.log(process.env) within the app, I don't see NODE_ENV or CUSTOM. Any ideas what's happening?
By the way, NODE_ENV=production node app.js works just fine.
From the sudo man page (Ubuntu version of sudo)
There are two distinct ways to deal with environment variables. By default, the env_reset sudoers
option is enabled. This causes commands to be executed with a minimal environment containing TERM,
PATH, HOME, SHELL, LOGNAME, USER and USERNAME in addition to variables from the invoking process
permitted by the env_check and env_keep sudoers options. There is effectively a whitelist for
environment variables.
Sudo is resetting the environment. This is a frustrating aspect of using su and sudo in upstart or init scripts. Recent versions of upstart support specifying uid/gid without the use of sudo via the setuid/setgid directives as in the example below. Also note the use of chdir.
start on filesystem and started networking
respawn
chdir /var/www/yourapp
setuid yourapp
setgid yourapp
env NODE_ENV=production
env PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin
env CUSTOM=somevalue
exec /usr/local/bin/node app.js | /usr/bin/multilog s1024000 /var/log/yourapp 2>&1
For older versions of upstart, here's what I used to do to work around it.
description "start and stop the example.com node.js server"
start on filesystem and started networking
respawn
chdir /path/to/your/code
exec su -c 'PATH=$PWD/node/bin NODE_ENV=$(cat node_env.txt) ./node/bin/node app/server.js' www-data >> tmp/stdout.log 2>&1
Note that I just put a node_env.txt file in my app root that sets production mode, because I hate environment variables. You can just do NODE_ENV=production right there if you prefer.
Just for the record. The Upstart Cookbook recommends the usage of start-stop-daemon instead of su or sudo when your Upstart version does not implement setuid.
But, unless you are still using 10.04 LTS (Lucid Lynx) which only has Upstart version 0.6.5, you should be using the setuid/setgid directives.
This has been working for me to set node env variables in upstart.
#!upstart
start on runlevel [2345]
stop on runlevel [016]
respawn
script
echo $$ > /var/run/app.pid
exec sudo NODE_ENV=production /opt/node/bin/node /opt/myapp/app.js >> /var/log/app.sys.log 2>&1
end script
visudo has a line to define environment variables to be kept.
sudo visudo
and add your env to:
Defaults env_keep="YOUR_ENV ..."
and reboot.