{"id":2952,"date":"2021-08-07T13:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-08-07T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chewett.co.uk\/blog\/?p=2952"},"modified":"2021-07-31T15:18:10","modified_gmt":"2021-07-31T14:18:10","slug":"running-a-python-script-on-boot-with-systemd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chewett.co.uk\/blog\/2952\/running-a-python-script-on-boot-with-systemd\/","title":{"rendered":"Running a Python Script on Boot with Systemd"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

This short blog post details how you can run a python script on boot using systemd.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Using Systemd to manage the python script<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Systemd is a daemon that is used to control various aspects of services and initialization scripts that run on and after boot. It is used by a wide range of Linux systems and provides a simple interface to define services that it will launch on boot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this case I am going to use it to launch a python script when the Raspberry Pi boots, to turn on the scripts for the Raspberry Pi Cluster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Creating the Service file<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The service file should live under the folder \/etc\/systemd\/system<\/code> and should end in .service<\/code>. My example file is:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\/etc\/systemd\/system\/raspberry-pi-cluster.service<\/code><\/p>\n\n\n

\n[unit]\nDescription=Raspberry Pi Cluster\nAfter=multi-user.target\n\n[Service]\nType=idle\nExecStart=\/usr\/bin\/python3 \/home\/pi\/Documents\/RaspberryPiCluster\/basic_primary.py\nUser=pi\n\n[Install]\nWantedBy=multi-user.target\n<\/pre><\/div>\n\n\n
Here the description is used to help idetify what the service is doing. <\/p>\n\n\n
\nExecStart=\/usr\/bin\/python3 \/home\/pi\/Documents\/RaspberryPiCluster\/basic_primary.py\n<\/pre><\/div>\n\n\n
The ExecStart<\/code> references the script that you want to run to start the service. It is recommended to use the full paths to all executables so they can be launched by the process which might not have the location in its path variable.<\/p>\n\n\n
\nUser=pi\n<\/pre><\/div>\n\n\n
In my case I also put the User field in the configuration so it will be launched as the pi user. By default it will launch as root.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Starting and enabling the service<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Once your service file has been created you will need to enable and start the service.<\/p>\n\n\n
\nsystemctl daemon-reload\nsystemctl enable raspberry-pi-cluster.service\nsystemctl start raspberry-pi-cluster.service\n<\/pre><\/div>\n\n\n
Here the systemd settings are reloaded and your new service will be discovered. Once this is done we can enable the service (so it will run on startup) and then start it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once done the service will automatically run on boot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you have any further questions as to how to do this, feel free to drop a comment below. If this worked or you have any suggested tweaks I would love to know too!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This short blog post details how you can run a python script on boot using systemd.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2959,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Today I am talking about how you can run a #Python Script on Boot with #Systemd","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5],"tags":[39,184,198,37,413],"class_list":["post-2952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-informational","tag-linux","tag-python","tag-python-3","tag-raspberry-pi","tag-systemd"],"wppr_data":{"cwp_meta_box_check":"No"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chewett.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/systemd_bootup_posticon_OUTPUT.png?fit=1200%2C628&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2toWX-LC","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2002,"url":"https:\/\/chewett.co.uk\/blog\/2002\/raspberry-pi-cluster-node-12-automatic-start-with-rc-local\/","url_meta":{"origin":2952,"position":0},"title":"Raspberry Pi Cluster Node \u2013 12 Automatic Start with rc.local","author":"Chewett","date":"March 6, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"This post builds on\u00a0my previous posts in the Raspberry Pi Cluster series by creating a script which automatically starts the slave and master with rc.local. 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