Skip to content

Files

Latest commit

kazrakcomkazrakcom
Major update to add the ability to run calblink as a service.
Dec 28, 2024
1e0c171 · Dec 28, 2024

History

History
47 lines (33 loc) · 1.98 KB

SERVICE.md

File metadata and controls

47 lines (33 loc) · 1.98 KB

Running calblink as a service

What does this do?

Calblink now supports a mode where it runs as a service. This means that it is managed by your operating system instead of needing to manually run it. This service can be turned on and survive reboots.

What operating systems does this mode support?

It has only been tested on macOS. Theoretically it should work on Linux and other Unix-style operating systems, and might possibly work on Windows. Try it out and if you have issues, let me know.

What potential problems are there for this mode?

calblink currently doesn't cope well with not having a blink(1) installed when it is run. It will exit after enough failures to control the blink(1), if it doesn't segfault first. This mode works best for cases where a machine has a blink(1) set up at all times. Alternately, if you have a way of controlling launch daemons based on USB events (EventScripts or similar on macOS) you can use that to only run calblink when there is a blink(1) plugged in.

If you don't disable the launch daemon when there isn't a blink(1) plugged in, calblink will crash and be automatically restarted every ten seconds or so.

How do I set this up?

These instructions assume macOS.

  1. Install calblink like you normally would, then make sure your configuration is set up the way you want.

  2. Run calblink as follows:

    ./calblink -runAsService -service install

    This will install a launch agent in ~/Library/LaunchAgents.

  3. You can then control it with launchctl like any other launch agent, or run calblink to control the agent:

    ./calblink -runAsService -service start

    Available commands include start, stop, restart, install, and uninstall.

  4. Log messages will go into your home directory, in calblink.out.log and calblink.err.log. Unless debug is turned on, there should be minimal logging. One log line is created at startup and shutdown, and fatal errors will be logged to the error log.