How to run a shell script at startup

First create your startup script @ /home/user/startup.sh, and make it executable

chmod +x /home/user/startup.sh

Then set a crontab for it:

$ crontab -e
@reboot  /home/user/startup.sh

Now your your startup.sh script will run at every start.

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The file you put in /etc/init.d/ have to be set to executable with:

chmod +x /etc/init.d/start_my_app

As pointed out by @meetamit, if it still does not run you might have to create a symbolic link to the file in /etc/rc.d/

ln -s /etc/init.d/start_my_app /etc/rc.d/

Please note that on the latest versions of Debian, this will not work as your script will have to be LSB compliant (provide at least the following actions: start, stop, restart, force-reload, and status): https://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts

As a note, you should always use the absolute path to files in your scripts instead of the relative one, it may solve unexpected issues:

/var/myscripts/start_my_app

Finally, make sure that you included the shebang on top of the file:

#!/bin/sh

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A simple approach is to add a line in /etc/rc.local :

/PATH/TO/MY_APP &

or if you want to run the command as a special user :

su - USER_FOOBAR -c /PATH/TO/MY_APP &

(the trailing ampersand backgrounds the process and allows the rc.local to continue executing)

If you want a full init script, debian distro have a template file, so :

cp /etc/init.d/skeleton /etc/init.d/your_app

and adapt it a bit.

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This is the way I do it on Red Hat Linux systems.

Put your script in /etc/init.d, owned by root and executable. At the top of the script, you can give a directive for chkconfig. Example, the following script is used to start a Java application as user oracle.

The name of the script is /etc/init.d/apex

#!/bin/bash
# chkconfig: 345 99 10
# Description: auto start apex listener
#
case "$1" in
 'start')
   su - oracle -c "cd /opt/apex ; java -jar apex.war > logs/apex.log 2>logs/apex_error.log &";;
 'stop')
   echo "put something to shutdown or kill the process here";;
esac

This says that the script must run at levels 3, 4, and 5, and the priority for start/stop is 99 and 10.

Then, as user root you can use chkconfig to enable or disable the script at startup:

chkconfig --list apex
chkconfig --add apex

And you can use service start/stop apex.

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Enter cron using sudo:

sudo crontab -e

Add a command to run upon start up, in this case a script:

@reboot sh /home/user/test.sh

Save:

Press ESC then :x to save and exit, or hit ESC then ZZ (that's shift+zz)

Test Test Test:

Run your test script without cron to make sure it actually works. Make sure you saved your command in cron, use sudo crontab -e Reboot the server to confirm it all works sudo @reboot

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Just have a line added to your crontab..

Make sure the file is executable:

chmod +x /path_to_you_file/your_file

To edit crontab file:

crontab -e

Line you have to add:

@reboot  /path_to_you_file/your_file

That simple!

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Another option is to have an @reboot command in your crontab.

Not every version of cron supports this, but if your instance is based on the Amazon Linux AMI then it will work.

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Edit the rc.local file using nano or gedit editor and add your scripts in it. File path could be /etc/rc.local or /etc/rc.d/rc.local.

sudo nano /etc/rc.local

This is the edit:

#!/bin/sh
/path-to-your-script/your-scipt-name.sh

once done press ctrl+o to update, pressEnter then ctrl+x.

Make the file executable.

sudo chmod 755 /etc/rc.local

Then initiate the rc-local service to run script during boot.

sudo systemctl start rc-local

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You can do it :

chmod +x PATH_TO_YOUR_SCRIPT/start_my_app 

then use this command

update-rc.d start_my_app defaults 100

Please see this page on Cyberciti.

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The absolute easiest method if all you want to run is a simple script, (or anything) is if you have a gui to use system > preferences then startup apps.

just browse to the script you want and there you go. (make script executable)

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https://i.stack.imgur.com/EVO6n.png

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Create your own /init executable

This is not what you want, but it is fun!

Just pick an arbitrary executable file, even a shell script, and boot the kernel with the command line parameter:

init=/path/to/myinit

Towards the end of boot, the Linux kernel runs the first userspace executable at the given path.

Several projects provide popular init executables used by major distros, e.g. systemd, and in most distros init will fork a bunch of processes used in normal system operation.

But we can hijack /init it to run our own minimal scripts to better understand our system.

Here is a minimal reproducible setup: https://github.com/cirosantilli/linux-kernel-module-cheat/tree/f96d4d55c9caa7c0862991025e1291c48c33e3d9/README.md#custom-init

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Many answers on starting something at boot, but often you want to start it just a little later, because your script depends on e.g. networking. Use at to just add this delay, e.g.:

at now + 1 min -f /path/yourscript

You may add this in /etc/rc.local, but also in cron like:

# crontab -e
@reboot at now + 1 min -f /path/yourscript

Isn't it fun to combine cron and at? Info is in the man page man at.

As for the comments that @reboot may not be widely supported, just try it. I found out that /etc/rc.local has become obsolete on distros that support systemd, such as ubuntu and raspbian.

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multi ways to finish it:

crontab rc.local init.d systemd

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I refered to this blog, always sound a good choice

https://blog.xyzio.com/2016/06/14/setting-up-a-golang-website-to-autorun-on-ubuntu-using-systemd/

vim /lib/systemd/system/gosite.service

Description=A simple go website
ConditionPathExists=/home/user/bin/gosite

[Service]
Restart=always
RestartSec=3
ExecStart=/home/user/bin/gosite

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

systemctl enable gosite.service

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For Debian 9 see https://askubuntu.com/questions/228304/how-do-i-run-a-script-at-start-up. It is helped me. Short version for Debian 9: add commands (as root) to /etc/rc.local

/path_to_file/filename.sh ||  exit 1   # Added by me
exit 0

Probably, /path_to_file/filename.sh should be executable (I think so).

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In Lubuntu I had to deal with the opposite situation. Skype start running after booting and I found in ~/.config/autostart/ the file skypeforlinux.desktop. The content of the file is as follows:

[Desktop Entry]
Name=Skype for Linux
Comment=Skype Internet Telephony
Exec=/usr/bin/skypeforlinux
Icon=skypeforlinux
Terminal=false
Type=Application
StartupNotify=false
X-GNOME-Autostart-enabled=true

Deleting this file helped me.

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Here is a simpler method!

First: write a shell script and save it a .sh here is an example

#!/bin/bash
Icoff='/home/akbar/keyboardONOFF/icon/Dt6hQ.png'
id=13
fconfig=".keyboard"
echo "disabled" > $fconfig
xinput float $id
notify-send -i $Icoff "Internal Keyboard disabled";

this script will disable the internal keyboard at startup.

Second: Open the application " Startup Application Preferences"

enter image description here

enter image description here

Third: click Add. fourth: in the NAME section give a name. fifth: In the command section browse to your .sh . sixth: edit your command section to:

bash <space> path/to/file/<filename>.sh <space> --start

seventh: click Add. Thats it! Finished!

Now confirm by rebooting your pc.

cheers!

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Add your script to /etc/init.d/ directory

Update your rc run-levels: $ update-rc.d myScript.sh defaults NN where NN is the order in which it should be executed. 99 for example will mean it would be run after 98 and before 100.

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Painless, easiest and the most universal method is simply executing it with ~.bash_profile or ~.profile (if you don't have bash_profile file).

Just add the execution command at the bottom of that file and it will be executed when system started.

I have this one at the bottom an example; ~\Desktop\sound_fixer.sh

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Working with Python 3 microservices or shell; using Ubuntu Server 18.04 (Bionic Beaver) or Ubuntu 19.10 (Eoan Ermine) or Ubuntu 18.10 (Cosmic Cuttlefish) I always do like these steps, and it worked always too:

Creating a microservice called p example "brain_microservice1.service" in my case: $ nano /lib/systemd/system/brain_microservice1.service Inside this new service that you are in: [Unit] Description=brain_microservice_1 After=multi-user.target [Service] Type=simple ExecStart=/usr/bin/python3.7 /root/scriptsPython/RUN_SERVICES/microservices /microservice_1.py -k start -DFOREGROUND ExecStop=/usr/bin/python3.7 /root/scriptsPython/RUN_SERVICES/microservices/microservice_1.py -k graceful-stop ExecReload=/usr/bin/python3.7 /root/scriptsPython/RUN_SERVICES/microservices/microservice_1.py -k graceful PrivateTmp=true LimitNOFILE=infinity KillMode=mixed Restart=on-failure RestartSec=5s [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target Give the permissions: $ chmod -X /lib/systemd/system/brain_microservice* $ chmod -R 775 /lib/systemd/system/brain_microservice* Give the execution permission then: $ systemctl daemon-reload Enable then, this will make then always start on startup $ systemctl enable brain_microservice1.service Then you can test it; $ sudo reboot now Finish = SUCCESS!!

This can be done with the same body script to run shell, react ... database startup script ... any kind os code ... hope this help u...

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For some people, this will work:

You could simply add the following command into System → Preferences → Startup Applications:

bash /full/path/to/your/script.sh

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