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NAME

service - run a System V init script

SYNOPSIS

service SCRIPT COMMAND [OPTIONS]

service --status-all

service --help | -h | --version

DESCRIPTION

service runs a System V init script or systemd unit in as predictable an environment as possible, removing most environment variables and with the current working directory set to /.

The SCRIPT parameter specifies a System V init script, located in /etc/init.d/SCRIPT, or the name of a systemd unit. The existence of a systemd unit of the same name as a script in /etc/init.d will cause the unit to take precedence over the init.d script. The supported values of COMMAND depend on the invoked script. service passes COMMAND and OPTIONS to the init script unmodified. For systemd units, start, stop, status, and reload are passed through to their systemctl/initctl equivalents.

All scripts should support at least the start and stop commands. As a special case, if COMMAND is --full-restart, the script is run twice, first with the stop command, then with the start command. Note, that unlike update-rc.d(8), service does not check /usr/sbin/policy-rc.d.

service --status-all runs all init scripts, in alphabetical order, with the status command. The status is [ + ] for running services, [ - ] for stopped services and [ ? ] for services without a status command. This option only calls status for sysvinit jobs.

EXIT CODES

service calls the init script and returns the status returned by it.

FILES

/etc/init.d

The directory containing System V init scripts.

/{lib,run,etc}/systemd/system

The directories containing systemd units.

ENVIRONMENT

LANG, LANGUAGE, LC_CTYPE, LC_NUMERIC, LC_TIME, LC_COLLATE, LC_MONETARY,
LC_MESSAGES, LC_PAPER, LC_NAME, LC_ADDRESS, LC_TELEPHONE,
LC_MEASUREMENT, LC_IDENTIFICATION, LC_ALL, TERM, PATH

The only environment variables passed to the init scripts.

SEE ALSO

/etc/init.d/skeleton
update-rc.d(8)
init(8)
invoke-rc.d(8)
systemctl(1)

AUTHOR