Automatically restarting Open Balena after reboot

openBalena
#1

There is a thread on GitHub around the automatic restart behaviour of Open Balena (https://github.com/balena-io/open-balena/issues/83), but it seems for the executing the startup script (’/scripts/compose up’) an init system will be used. I was surprised not to see a systemd service script for this.

Here is what I am looking to use, would be good to clarify whether there is an alternative already provided somewhere, or any comments on the below:

[Unit]
Description=Start OpenBalena
After=docker.service
BindsTo=docker.service
ReloadPropagatedFrom=docker.service

[Service]
Type=simple
User=balena
ExecStart=/home/balena/open-balena/scripts/compose up
ExecStop=/home/balena/open-balena/scripts/compose stop
Restart=on-failure

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

#8

Hello @maggie OpenBalena is designed to be a flexible solution for users and as a result we do not tie ourselves to a particular init system. This allows users to choose a start-up method that works best for their needs. In this case you are welcome to either add restart: always to the docker compose file or use a systemd script as you wish. We also find that not restarting OpenBalena by default is very useful during development and debugging as the logs are preserved.

#10

For anyone drawing on this, suggest including a timeout not included in the initial post:

[Unit]
Description=Start OpenBalena
After=docker.service
BindsTo=docker.service
ReloadPropagatedFrom=docker.service

[Service]
Type=simple
User=balena
ExecStart=/home/balena/open-balena/scripts/compose up
ExecStop=/home/balena/open-balena/scripts/compose stop
TimeoutStopSec=120
Restart=on-failure

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target