Getting a script to run at boot

[Mike Makonnen]

On Sat, Oct 06, 2007 at 02:30:10PM -0500, Jay Banks wrote:
> 
> 
> >This may mean that the program didn't damonize. If it didn't then 
> >obviously
> >it will terminate when you terminate the terminal you started it from. Do
> >you get your prompt back after you run this command?
> 
> No I don't. The script specifically has a command line to run as a dameon:
> 
> -d, --daemon - daemon mode: make sntop capable of running in the back-
>     ground.  note, it wont automatically fork into the background.
> 
> If I remove -d from the flags in /etc/rc.conf, the script will just display
> to the terminal screen. When I put -d back in, it will run and output
> the html file, refreshes when it is supposed to, and everything looks
> good, but I do not get the prompt back afterwards.
> 
> When I reboot, the html output file is wiped out and contains no
> data, and the process does not show up in the running processes.
> 
> What exactly does, "it wont automatically fork into the background,"
> mean?

Well, that's the problem then. The '--daemon' switch is misleading. You
should get it to work as expected by adding a '&' at the end of the
command-line. Just for kicks I installed it on my system and with
the attached script and the following in my /etc/rc.conf it seems to
work as expected (though I haven't tried running it on startup):

sntop_enable=yes
sntop_flags="-d -r 30 -f /usr/local/etc/sntoprc -w -e /home/mtm/public_html/sntop.html"
sntop_nice=5

Cheers.
-- 
Mike Makonnen         | GPG-KEY: http://people.freebsd.org/~mtm/mtm.asc
mmakonnen @ gmail.com | AC7B 5672 2D11 F4D0 EBF8  5279 5359 2B82 7CD4 1F55
mtm @ FreeBSD.Org     | FreeBSD - http://www.freebsd.org
-------------- next part --------------
#!/bin/sh                                                                       
#                                                                               
# PROVIDE: sntop                                                                
# REQUIRE: DAEMON                                                               
# KEYWORD: shutdown                                                             

#                                                                               
# DO NOT CHANGE THESE DEFAULT VALUES HERE                                       
# SET THEM IN THE /etc/rc.conf FILE                                             
#                                                                               
sntop_enable=${sntop_enable-"NO"}
sntop_flags=${sntop_flags-""}

. /etc/rc.subr

name="sntop"
rcvar=`set_rcvar`
command="/usr/local/bin/${name}"
command_args="&"

load_rc_config $name
run_rc_command "$1"