How to make a Python script run like a service or

Question

I have written a Python script that checks a certain e-mail address and passes new e-mails to an external program. How can I get this script to execute 24/7, such as turning it into daemon or service in Linux. Would I also need a loop that never ends in the program, or can it be done by just having the code re executed multiple times?

Answer 1

Had similar problem, the link below worked for me well: http://werxltd.com/wp/2012/01/05/simple-init-d-script-template/#footnote_0_1077

It uses nothing specific to any distributive, if chkconfig used, can be launched at system startup.

Answer 2

You can also make the python script run as a service using a shell script. First create a shell script to run the python script like this (scriptname arbitary name)

#!/bin/sh
script='/home/.. full path to script'
/usr/bin/python $script &

now make a file in /etc/init.d/scriptname

#! /bin/sh

PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin
DAEMON=/home/.. path to shell script scriptname created to run python script
PIDFILE=/var/run/scriptname.pid

test -x $DAEMON || exit 0

. /lib/lsb/init-functions

case "$1" in
  start)
     log_daemon_msg "Starting feedparser"
     start_daemon -p $PIDFILE $DAEMON
     log_end_msg $?
   ;;
  stop)
     log_daemon_msg "Stopping feedparser"
     killproc -p $PIDFILE $DAEMON
     PID=`ps x |grep feed | head -1 | awk '{print $1}'`
     kill -9 $PID       
     log_end_msg $?
   ;;
  force-reload|restart)
     $0 stop
     $0 start
   ;;
  status)
     status_of_proc -p $PIDFILE $DAEMON atd && exit 0 || exit $?
   ;;
 *)
   echo "Usage: /etc/init.d/atd {start|stop|restart|force-reload|status}"
   exit 1
  ;;
esac

exit 0

Now you can start and stop your python script using the command /etc/init.d/scriptname start or stop.

Answer 3

You can use fork() to detach your script from the tty and have it continue to run, like so:

import os, sys
fpid = os.fork()
if fpid!=0:
  # Running as daemon now. PID is fpid
  sys.exit(0)

Of course you also need to implement an endless loop, like

while 1:
  do_your_check()
  sleep(5)

Hope this get's you started.

Answer 4

cron is clearly a great choice for many purposes. However it doesn't create a service or daemon as you requested in the OP. cron just runs jobs periodically (meaning the job starts and stops), and no more often than once / minute. There are issues with cron -- for example, if a prior instance of your script is still running the next time the cron schedule comes around and launches a new instance, is that OK? cron doesn't handle dependencies; it just tries to start a job when the schedule says to.

If you find a situation where you truly need a daemon (a process that never stops running), take a look at supervisord. It provides a simple way to wrapper a normal, non-daemonized script or program and make it operate like a daemon. This is a much better way than creating a native Python daemon.

Answer 5

to creating some thing that is running like service you can use this thing :

The first thing that you must do is installing the Cement framework: Cement frame work is a CLI frame work that you can deploy your application on it.

command line interface of the app :

interface.py

 from cement.core.foundation import CementApp
 from cement.core.controller import CementBaseController, expose
 from YourApp import yourApp

 class Meta:
    label = 'base'
    description = "your application description"
    arguments = [
        (['-r' , '--run'],
          dict(action='store_true', help='Run your application')),
        (['-v', '--version'],
          dict(action='version', version="Your app version")),
        ]
        (['-s', '--stop'],
          dict(action='store_true', help="Stop your application")),
        ]

    @expose(hide=True)
    def default(self):
        if self.app.pargs.run:
            #Start to running the your app from there !
            YourApp.yourApp()
        if self.app.pargs.stop:
            #Stop your application
            YourApp.yourApp.stop()

 class App(CementApp):
       class Meta:
       label = 'Uptime'
       base_controller = 'base'
       handlers = [MyBaseController]

 with App() as app:
       app.run()

YourApp.py class:

 import threading

 class yourApp:
     def __init__:
        self.loger = log_exception.exception_loger()
        thread = threading.Thread(target=self.start, args=())
        thread.daemon = True
        thread.start()

     def start(self):
        #Do every thing you want
        pass
     def stop(self):
        #Do some things to stop your application

Keep in mind that your app must run on a thread to be daemon

To run the app just do this in command line

python interface.py --help

Answer 6

Recipe 278731: Creating a daemon the Python way