Option to ask/not overwrite previous hostd.service

[kocoten1992]

Hi, currently everytime hostd upgrade, it will overwrite hostd.service file in /etc/systemd/system/hostd.service file.

I believe there are better options:

1. Show user the diff / ask user what to do with it.
2. When upgrade in non interactive mode - it should left previous hostd.service version untouch and maybe create hostd.service-dpkg file (for newer version - I'm not sure what is the best practice on debian).

[kocoten1992]

for the context, I config this:

[Unit]
Description=hostd: the next generation Sia host

After=network.target
[Service]
ExecStart=/usr/bin/hostd
WorkingDirectory=/mnt/storage/sia/ # I chang this line
Restart=always
RestartSec=15
TimeoutStopSec=120

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
Alias=hostd.service

It overwrite hostd.service everytime, so I need to go to this file and change it back.

[NickJH]

Difficult subject. In RedHat etc, the packaged service file should go into /usr/lib/systemd/system and not /etc/systemd/system. You could then override it with a file in /etc/systemd/system. I believe this works in Ubuntu/Debian. To override files in /etc/systemd/system, there is an approach in https://www.baeldung.com/linux/systemd-modify-config. The method is a manual method. https://serverfault.com/questions/840996/modify-systemd-unit-file-without-altering-upstream-unit-file describes the systemctl edit <service> command which can achieve the same. Note you cannot use systemctl edit --full <unit file>. Note that /lib symlinks to /usr/lib so any paths you find mentioning /lib/systemd/system are synonymous with /usr/lib/systemd/system.

To me the Debian/Ubuntu packaging spec (or, perhaps, the systemd spec) needs to be checked to see where the service files should go but I believe it is in /usr/lib/systemd/system, However in the manual set up instructions for the services it is correct that they go in /etc/systemd/system as thes are not packaged files.

[NickJH]

More information.

The packaging spec has https://wiki.debian.org/Teams/pkg-systemd/Packaging. In this it implies the service file should go in /lib/systemd/system. It also says users can then use /etc/systemd/system.

It also mentions that if you use the Debian packaging system, you should name the file whatever.service and invoke the dh_installinit script which will place the service file in the right place. You can see the dh_installinit package at https://github.com/Debian/debhelper/blob/master/dh_installinit and around line 65:

=item debian/I<package>.service

If this exists, it is installed into lib/systemd/system/I<package>.service in
the package build directory. Only used in compat levels 10 and below.

So, please, the packaged service file in /lib/systemd/system? And leave the howto for a manual installation with it in /etc/systemd/system.

[ChrisSchinnerl]

With everything going on around the hardfork we are currently too low on bandwidth to dive into distro-specific best practices, changing things and testing them but we are open to contributions in form of PRs to improve the process. In this case, we'd need to verify the change doesn't break anything for existing users and works as expected.

[NickJH]

I am afraid I am only really experienced with packaging Centos7 type packages complying (more or less) with the Fedora packaging spec, and I am not really a developer anyway. I am not talking distro-specific best practices. Debian and Ubuntu adhere to the same specs in this regard and are the only distros packaged by the Foundation. Really they ought to conform. This is why the yml file moved to under /etc and so on. It is just that more work is required.

I have no idea about how the Foundation build packages but can try to help a bit with pointers. Can you point me to what controls the packaging?

Where do I even file bugs? I don't think it should be against hostd as it would also be relevant to renterd and walletd and any other packages that are built. I can file a bug against hostd if you want.

[n8mgr]

It's a bit of a pain to update. The package building is controlled here:

linux/.github/workflows/build.yml

Lines 89 to 137 in 3f9fc2d

	BUILD_NAME=${{ matrix.distro }}_${{ env.PROJECT }}_${VERSION}_${arch}
	# Create the directory structure for the .deb package
	mkdir -p ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN
	mkdir -p ${BUILD_NAME}/usr/bin
	mkdir -p ${BUILD_NAME}/var/lib/${{ env.PROJECT }}
	mkdir -p ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system
	# Copy the ${{ env.PROJECT }} binary
	unzip ./artifacts/${{ env.PROJECT }}_linux_${arch}.zip -d ./artifacts/${arch}/
	cp ./artifacts/${arch}/${{ env.PROJECT }} ${BUILD_NAME}/usr/bin/${{ env.PROJECT }}
	# Create the control file
	echo "Package: ${{ env.PROJECT }}" > ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/control
	echo "Version: $VERSION" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/control
	echo "Architecture: ${arch}" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/control
	echo "Maintainer: The Sia Foundation <hello@sia.tech>" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/control
	echo "Priority: optional" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/control
	echo "Section: net" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/control
	echo "Description: ${DESCRIPTION}" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/control
	echo "Homepage: https://github.com/SiaFoundation/${{ env.PROJECT }}" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/control
	# Create systemd service file
	echo "[Unit]" > ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "Description=${DESCRIPTION}" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "After=network.target" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "[Service]" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "ExecStart=/usr/bin/${{ env.PROJECT }}" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "WorkingDirectory=/var/lib/${{ env.PROJECT }}" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "Restart=always" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "RestartSec=15" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "TimeoutStopSec=120" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "[Install]" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "WantedBy=multi-user.target" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	echo "Alias=${{ env.PROJECT }}.service" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/etc/systemd/system/${{ env.PROJECT }}.service
	# Create the prerem script
	echo "#!/bin/sh" > ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/prerm
	echo "systemctl stop ${{ env.PROJECT }}.service" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/prerm
	echo "systemctl disable ${{ env.PROJECT }}.service" >> ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/prerm
	chmod +x ${BUILD_NAME}/DEBIAN/prerm
	# Build the .deb file
	echo "Building ${BUILD_NAME}.deb"
	dpkg-deb --build ${BUILD_NAME}

.

Add any suggestions as individual issues on this repo. We'll use this issue to track moving the service file so it can be overwritten safely. We might be able to allocate some time to it after the hardfork launches.

[kocoten1992]

Another issue is that, when upgrade hostd, it overwrite systemctl enable hostd, if someone forgot to enable it, the next reboot and hostd will not come up..