PiCN-systemd-service

This repository provides instructions and configuration files to run PiCN executables as systemd services.

Installation

• Clone PiCN, if not yet available on your system: git clone https://github.com/cn-uofbasel/PiCN.git

• Download the service definitions to /etc/systemd/system

• Adjust the path in the downloaded files to the location of PiCN

• Add a new user picn which runs the PiCN instances: useradd --system picn. Alternatively, you can set User in the downloaded file to an existing user (not recommended).

Usage

Available systemd services are:

• picn-forwarder
• picn-nfn

The follow examples explain how to manage a PiCN forwarder. All other services are handled equally.

Starting and Stopping

A PiCN forwarder (default configuration) is started and stopped with following commands:

you@machine:~$ systemctl start picn-forwarder@none
you@machine:~$ systemctl stop picn-forwarder@none

To change default arguments, the path of a configuration file can be passed instead of none:

you@machine:~$ systemctl start picn-forwarder@-path-to-config-file
you@machine:~$ systemctl stop picn-forwarder@-path-to-config-file

The configuration file path must be escaped. The tool systemd-escape helps to generate escaped paths:

you@machine:~$ systemd-escape '/path/to/config/file'
-path-to-config-file

By using multiple configuration files, more than one instance of a PiCN executable can be started as systemd services.

Enabling and Disabling

A service can be enabled to start when the system boots:

you@machine:~$ systemctl enable picn-forwarder@none

Note that this does not start the service immediately. The service can be started as described in the previous section (if not yet running) or will start on reboot. A service can be disabled as following:

you@machine:~$ systemctl disable picn-forwarder@none

Status Monitoring

The following command shows status information of a service and logging output that PiCN instance:

you@machine:~$ systemctl status picn-forwarder@none
...

All PiCN-related services are listed as following:

you@machine:~$ systemctl list-units --type service | grep 'picn'
...