Distrobox Automatic Update Service

This service automatically runs distrobox-upgrade --all once a day to keep all your Distrobox containers up to date.

Prerequisites

• A Linux system using systemd
• Distrobox installed and configured
• sudo privileges

Installation

1. Create the service file:

   sudo vim /etc/systemd/system/distrobox-upgrade.service

   Copy and paste the following content:

   [Unit]
   Description=Distrobox Upgrade Service
   After=network.target
   
   [Service]
   Type=oneshot
   ExecStart=/usr/bin/distrobox-upgrade --all
   User=YOUR_USERNAME
   
   [Install]
   WantedBy=multi-user.target

   Replace YOUR_USERNAME with your actual username.

2. Create the timer file:

   sudo vim /etc/systemd/system/distrobox-upgrade.timer

   Copy and paste the following content:

   [Unit]
   Description=Run Distrobox Upgrade daily
   
   [Timer]
   OnCalendar=daily
   Persistent=true
   
   [Install]
   WantedBy=timers.target

3. Reload systemd, enable and start the timer:

   sudo systemctl daemon-reload
   sudo systemctl enable distrobox-upgrade.timer
   sudo systemctl start distrobox-upgrade.timer

Verification

To verify that the service is set up correctly:

1. Check the status of the timer:

   sudo systemctl status distrobox-upgrade.timer

2. List all timers:

   sudo systemctl list-timers

   You should see distrobox-upgrade.timer in the list.

Customization

• To change the frequency of updates, modify the OnCalendar value in the distrobox-upgrade.timer file. For example, to run weekly instead of daily, use OnCalendar=weekly.
• To run the upgrade at a specific time, use a value like OnCalendar=*-*-* 02:00:00 (this would run it at 2 AM every day).

Troubleshooting

• Check the system logs for any error messages:

  journalctl -u distrobox-upgrade.service

• Ensure that the user specified in the service file has the necessary permissions to run distrobox-upgrade --all.

Uninstallation

To remove the service:

1. Stop and disable the timer:

   sudo systemctl stop distrobox-upgrade.timer
   sudo systemctl disable distrobox-upgrade.timer

2. Remove the service and timer files:

   sudo rm /etc/systemd/system/distrobox-upgrade.service
   sudo rm /etc/systemd/system/distrobox-upgrade.timer

3. Reload systemd:

   sudo systemctl daemon-reload