Service

What

After reading a ton of material on init frameworks and service management for different OSes; Going through mental debate of smartness of one versus another and their historical backlog and tech debt, as well as developer and user friendliness of the material provided which in itself can drive away companies and engineering force to provide support for one or another platform - THE TAKE AWAY IS - In the end what matters is to have an OS efficient and developer friendly mechanics to manipulate a service.

This repo proposes to create a portable SERVICE definition that can be used by developers and businesses to implement their products on a range of platforms without worrying about misunderstanding the genius on each of those.

Reference Implementations

Go implementation	https://github.com/codemodify/systemkit-service
Command line tool	https://github.com/codemodify/systemkit-service-cli
Samples & Tests	https://github.com/codemodify/systemkit-service-tests
Init Frameworks	https://github.com/codemodify/systemkit-service-encoders-rc_d
	https://github.com/codemodify/systemkit-service-encoders-launchd
	https://github.com/codemodify/systemkit-service-encoders-systemd
	https://github.com/codemodify/systemkit-service-encoders-systemv
	https://github.com/codemodify/systemkit-service-encoders-upstart

Where

• Use Case (A) - code
  • NewServiceFromSERVICE()
    • creates and controls a service based on SERVICE portable description
  • NewServiceFromName()
    • finds and controls an existing service based on its name; previously created by our app or something else
  • NewServiceFromPlatformTemplate()
    • create a service from a platform dependent template
    • template is already a service definition as it is defined by the one of init frameworks

• Use Case (B) - scripting
  • manipulate a service based on a SERVICE file
    • systemkit-service-spec-cli create/delete/start/stop/info -service SERVICE-FILE
  • manipulate a service based on commands and flags
    • systemkit-service-spec-cli create/delete/start/stop/info -name test-service -executable vim
  • compile your own service manipulator binary based on the systemkit-service-spec-cli source code

• Use Case (C) - convert
  • used as an ETL mechanism, used by scripting or cloud based services
  • convert SERVICE file to a platform dependent format
  • convert platform dependent format to SERVICE format
  • convert platform dependent format to a different platform dependent format, by going through SERVICE format

SERVICE format

{
	"name": "test-service",
	"description": "Test Service",
	"documentation": "http://test-service.com",
	"executable": "/bin/sleep",
	"args": [
		"40"
	],
	"workingDirectory": "/tmp",
	"environment": {
		"API_URL": "https://api.test-service.com"
	},
	"dependsOn": [
		"network"
	],
	"dependsOnOverrides": {
		"init_rc.d": {
			"remove": [
				"*"
			],
			"add": [
				"bumblebee",
				"mumbled"
			]
		},
		"init_systemd": {
			"add": [
				"printer"
			]
		},
		"os_freebsd": {
			"add": [
				"linux"
			]
		},
		"os_linux": {
			"add": [
				"bluetooth"
			]
		}
	},
	"start": {
		"atBoot": true,
		"restart": true,
		"restartTimeout": 10
	},
	"logging": {
		"stdout": {
			"disabled": false,
			"useDefault": false,
			"value": "/var/log/test-service-stdout.log"
		},
		"stderr": {
			"disabled": false,
			"useDefault": false,
			"value": "/var/log/test-service-stderr.log"
		}
	},
	"credentials": {
		"user": "user",
		"group": "group"
	}
}

References & Credits

Any missing credits are the author's unconscious error

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operating_system_service_management
• https://nosystemd.org
• https://ungleich.ch/en-us/cms/blog/2019/05/20/linux-distros-without-systemd
• https://lwn.net/Articles/578209/
• https://lwn.net/Articles/578210/
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Init
• https://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/articles/linux-users/startup.html
• https://sosheskaz.github.io/tutorial/2017/03/28/FreeBSD-rcd-Setup.html
• https://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/articles/rc-scripting/index.html
• https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/systemd.unit.html
• https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/systemd.service.html
• https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/systemd.directives.html
• https://www.manpagez.com/man/5/launchd.plist