systemd Developer Lennart Poettering lennart@poettering.net systemd-run 1 systemd-run Run programs in transient scope or service or timer units systemd-run OPTIONS COMMAND ARGS systemd-run OPTIONS TIMER OPTIONS COMMAND ARGS systemd-run may be used to create and start a transient .service or .scope unit and run the specified COMMAND in it. It may also be used to create and start transient .timer units. If a command is run as transient service unit, it will be started and managed by the service manager like any other service, and thus shows up in the output of systemctl list-units like any other unit. It will run in a clean and detached execution environment, with the service manager as its parent process. In this mode, systemd-run will start the service asynchronously in the background and return after the command has begun execution. If a command is run as transient scope unit, it will be started by systemd-run itself as parent process and will thus inherit the execution environment of the caller. However, the processes of the command are managed by the service manager similar to normal services, and will show up in the output of systemctl list-units. Execution in this case is synchronous, and will return only when the command finishes. This mode is enabled via the --scope switch (see below). If a command is run with timer options such as --on-calendar= (see below), a transient timer unit is created alongside the service unit for the specified command. Only the transient timer unit is started immediately, the transient service unit will be started when the transient timer elapses. If the --unit= is specified, the COMMAND may be omitted. In this case, systemd-run only creates a .timer unit that invokes the specified unit when elapsing. The following options are understood: --no-ask-password Do not query the user for authentication for privileged operations. --scope Create a transient .scope unit instead of the default transient .service unit. --unit= Use this unit name instead of an automatically generated one. --property= -p Sets a unit property for the scope or service unit that is created. This takes an assignment in the same format as systemctl1's set-property command. --description= Provide a description for the service or scope unit. If not specified, the command itself will be used as a description. See Description= in systemd.unit5. --slice= Make the new .service or .scope unit part of the specified slice, instead of the system.slice. --remain-after-exit After the service or scope process has terminated, keep the service around until it is explicitly stopped. This is useful to collect runtime information about the service after it finished running. Also see RemainAfterExit= in systemd.service5. --send-sighup When terminating the scope or service unit, send a SIGHUP immediately after SIGTERM. This is useful to indicate to shells and shell-like processes that the connection has been severed. Also see SendSIGHUP= in systemd.kill5. --service-type= Sets the service type. Also see Type= in systemd.service5. This option has no effect in conjunction with --scope. Defaults to simple. --uid= --gid= Runs the service process under the UNIX user and group. Also see User= and Group= in systemd.exec5. --nice= Runs the service process with the specified nice level. Also see Nice= in systemd.exec5. --setenv= Runs the service process with the specified environment variables set. Also see Environment= in systemd.exec5. --pty -t When invoking a command, the service connects its standard input and output to the invoking tty via a pseudo TTY device. This allows invoking binaries as services that expect interactive user input, such as interactive command shells. --quiet -q Suppresses additional informational output while running. This is particularly useful in combination with --pty when it will suppress the initial message explaining how to terminate the TTY connection. --on-active= --on-boot= --on-startup= --on-unit-active= --on-unit-inactive= Defines monotonic timers relative to different starting points. Also see OnActiveSec=, OnBootSec=, OnStartupSec=, OnUnitActiveSec= and OnUnitInactiveSec= in systemd.timer5. This options have no effect in conjunction with --scope. --on-calendar= Defines realtime (i.e. wallclock) timers with calendar event expressions. Also see OnCalendar= in systemd.timer5. This option has no effect in conjunction with --scope. --timer-property= Sets a timer unit property for the timer unit that is created. It is similar with --property but only for created timer unit. This option only has effect in conjunction with --on-active=, --on-boot=, --on-startup=, --on-unit-active=, --on-unit-inactive=, --on-calendar=. This takes an assignment in the same format as systemctl1's set-property command. --no-block Do not synchronously wait for the requested operation to finish. If this is not specified, the job will be verified, enqueued and systemd-run will wait until the unit's start-up is completed. By passing this argument, it is only verified and enqueued. All command line arguments after the first non-option argument become part of the command line of the launched process. If a command is run as service unit, its first argument needs to be an absolute binary path. On success, 0 is returned, a non-zero failure code otherwise. # systemd-run env Running as unit: run-19945.service # journalctl -u run-19945.service Sep 08 07:37:21 bupkis systemd[1]: Starting /usr/bin/env... Sep 08 07:37:21 bupkis systemd[1]: Started /usr/bin/env. Sep 08 07:37:21 bupkis env[19948]: PATH=/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin Sep 08 07:37:21 bupkis env[19948]: LANG=en_US.UTF-8 Sep 08 07:37:21 bupkis env[19948]: BOOT_IMAGE=/vmlinuz-3.11.0-0.rc5.git6.2.fc20.x86_64 # systemd-run -p BlockIOWeight=10 updatedb This command invokes the updatedb8 tool, but lowers the block I/O weight for it to 10. See systemd.resource-control5 for more information on the BlockIOWeight= property. The following command will touch a file after 30 seconds. # date; systemd-run --on-active=30 --timer-property=AccuracySec=100ms /bin/touch /tmp/foo Mon Dec 8 20:44:24 KST 2014 Running as unit: run-71.timer Will run service as unit: run-71.service # journalctl -b -u run-71.timer -- Logs begin at Fri 2014-12-05 19:09:21 KST, end at Mon 2014-12-08 20:44:54 KST. -- Dec 08 20:44:38 container systemd[1]: Starting /bin/touch /tmp/foo. Dec 08 20:44:38 container systemd[1]: Started /bin/touch /tmp/foo. # journalctl -b -u run-71.service -- Logs begin at Fri 2014-12-05 19:09:21 KST, end at Mon 2014-12-08 20:44:54 KST. -- Dec 08 20:44:48 container systemd[1]: Starting /bin/touch /tmp/foo... Dec 08 20:44:48 container systemd[1]: Started /bin/touch /tmp/foo. The following command invokes /bin/bash as a service passing its standard input, output and error to the calling TTY. # systemd-run -t --send-sighup /bin/bash $ systemd-run --scope --user screen Running scope as unit run-r14b0047ab6df45bfb45e7786cc839e76.scope. $ screen -ls There is a screen on: 492..laptop (Detached) 1 Socket in /var/run/screen/S-fatima. This starts the screen process as a child of the systemd --user process that was started by user@.service, in a scope unit. A systemd.scope5 unit is used instead of a systemd.service5 unit, because screen will exit when detaching from the terminal, and a service unit would be terminated. Running screen as a user unit has the advantage that it is not part of the session scope. If KillUserProcesses=yes is configured in logind.conf5, the default, the session scope will be terminated when the user logs out of that session. The user@.service is started automatically when the user first logs in, and stays around as long as at least one login session is open. After the user logs out of the last session, user@.service and all services underneath it are terminated. This behaviour is the default, when "lingering" is not enabled for that user. Enabling lingering means that user@.service is started automatically during boot, even if the user is not logged in, and that the service is not terminated when the user logs out. Enabling lingering allows the user to run processes without being logged in, for example to allow screen to persist after the user logs out, even if the session scope is terminated. In the default configuration, users can enable lingering for themselves: $ loginctl enable-linger systemd1, systemctl1, systemd.unit5, systemd.service5, systemd.scope5, systemd.slice5, systemd.exec5, systemd.resource-control5, systemd.timer5, machinectl1