Failed to start systemd service daemon on Ubuntu (how to switch to Upstart or is there an updated distro)

Note: I have no real experience in managing servers or using Linux at any deep level, so my knowledge and understanding is quite limited. Basically, I do it.

Full code examples refer to the address : https://github.com/Integralist/Vagrant-Examples/tree/master/nodejs.

This is a two-part problem:

1. can't mount my shared directory
2. systemd
   
   services unavailable

I'm trying to create a service that launches a NodeJS app, but it doesn't seem to be systemctl

available in the version of Ubuntu I installed ( https://vagrantcloud.com/ubuntu/trusty64 ).

Here is mine Vagrantfile

:

# -*- mode: ruby -*-
# vi: set ft=ruby :

VAGRANTFILE_API_VERSION = "2"

Vagrant.configure(VAGRANTFILE_API_VERSION) do |config|
  config.vm.box = "ubuntu/trusty64"

  # Working arround the "stdin: is not a tty" error, which appears when provisioning
  # config.ssh.pty = true

  config.vm.network :forwarded_port, guest: 80, host: 3000, auto_correct: true

  # We use Vagrant to create the new "web" group/owner for us
  # But we could have done this manually as part of our provisioning script
  #
  # useradd -mrU web
  # chown web /var/www
  # chgrp web /var/www
  # cd /var/www/
  # su web
  # git clone {code}
  config.vm.synced_folder "./", "/var/www", create: true, group: "web", owner: "web"

  config.vm.provision "shell" do |s|
    s.path = "provision/setup.sh"
  end
end

      

        
        
        
      

    

Below is the content of my setup.sh

preparation setup.sh

which creates the file .service

:

su root

mkdir -p /var/www

cat << 'EOF' > /etc/systemd/system/our-node-app.service
  [Service]
  WorkingDirectory=/var/www
  ExecStart=/usr/bin/nodejs boot.js
  ExecReload=/bin/kill -HUP $MAINPID
  Restart=always
  StandardOutput=syslog
  StandardError=syslog
  SyslogIdentifier=some-identifier-here-typically-matching-workingdirectory
  User=web
  Group=web
  Environment='NODE_ENV=production'

  [Install]
  WantedBy=multi-user.target
EOF

      

        
        
        
      

    

But when I run vagrant up

I get the following error:

Bringing machine 'default' up with 'virtualbox' provider...
==> default: Importing base box 'ubuntu/trusty64'...
==> default: Matching MAC address for NAT networking...
==> default: Checking if box 'ubuntu/trusty64' is up to date...
==> default: Setting the name of the VM: nodejs_default_1407743897168_39018
==> default: Clearing any previously set forwarded ports...
==> default: Fixed port collision for 22 => 2222. Now on port 2200.
==> default: Clearing any previously set network interfaces...
==> default: Preparing network interfaces based on configuration...
    default: Adapter 1: nat
==> default: Forwarding ports...
    default: 80 => 3000 (adapter 1)
    default: 22 => 2200 (adapter 1)
==> default: Booting VM...
==> default: Waiting for machine to boot. This may take a few minutes...
    default: SSH address: 127.0.0.1:2200
    default: SSH username: vagrant
    default: SSH auth method: private key
    default: Warning: Connection timeout. Retrying...
    default: Warning: Remote connection disconnect. Retrying...
==> default: Machine booted and ready!
==> default: Checking for guest additions in VM...
==> default: Mounting shared folders...
    default: /var/www => /Users/markmcdonnell/Box Sync/Library/Vagrant/nodejs

Failed to mount folders in Linux guest. This is usually because
the "vboxsf" file system is not available. Please verify that
the guest additions are properly installed in the guest and
can work properly. The command attempted was:

mount -t vboxsf -o uid='id -u web',gid='getent group web | cut -d: -f3' var_www /var/www
mount -t vboxsf -o uid='id -u web',gid='id -g web' var_www /var/www

      

        
        
        
      

    

So my first problem is that I cannot mount my shared folder.

Also, initially in my provisioning script (after creating the file our-node-app.service

) I would have the following:

systemctl enable our-node-app
systemctl start our-node-app
systemctl status our-node-app
journalctl -u node-sample # logs

      

        
        
        
      

    

If I add this back to my init script and then vagrant provision --provision-with shell

I get the following output:

==> default: Running provisioner: shell...
    default: Running: /var/folders/n0/jlvkmj5n36vc0932b_1t0kxh0000gn/T/vagrant-shell20140811-58128-fa27fk.sh
==> default: stdin: is not a tty
==> default: /tmp/vagrant-shell: line 25: systemctl: command not found
==> default: /tmp/vagrant-shell: line 26: systemctl: command not found
==> default: /tmp/vagrant-shell: line 27: systemctl: command not found
==> default: /tmp/vagrant-shell: line 28: journalctl: command not found
The following SSH command responded with a non-zero exit status.
Vagrant assumes that this means the command failed!

chmod +x /tmp/vagrant-shell && /tmp/vagrant-shell

Stdout from the command:



Stderr from the command:

stdin: is not a tty
/tmp/vagrant-shell: line 25: systemctl: command not found
/tmp/vagrant-shell: line 26: systemctl: command not found
/tmp/vagrant-shell: line 27: systemctl: command not found
/tmp/vagrant-shell: line 28: journalctl: command not found

      

        
        
        
      

    

Here I found a problem with the systemctl

command systemctl

.

I also tried changing the provisioning script so that instead of ...

systemctl enable our-node-app
systemctl start our-node-app
systemctl status our-node-app
journalctl -u node-sample # logs

      

        
        
        
      

    

... I would like to use ...

service our-node-app start
service --status-all | grep 'node'

      

        
        
        
      

    

This is because I read somewhere that Ubuntu does not support systemd

and instead uses something called upstart

to load all of its services. At the time, I assumed I could just use a different command and keep the script itself the same (it doesn't seem to be the case).

But all these changes showed that my service was not recognized:

==> default: Running provisioner: shell...
    default: Running: /var/folders/n0/jlvkmj5n36vc0932b_1t0kxh0000gn/T/vagrant-shell20140811-58428-iot9kx.sh
==> default: stdin: is not a tty
==> default: our-node-app: unrecognized service
==> default:  [ ? ]  apport
==> default:  [ ? ]  console-setup
==> default:  [ ? ]  cryptdisks
==> default:  [ ? ]  cryptdisks-early
==> default:  [ ? ]  dns-clean
==> default:  [ ? ]  irqbalance
==> default:  [ ? ]  killprocs
==> default:  [ ? ]  kmod
==> default:  [ ? ]  networking
==> default:  [ ? ]  ondemand
==> default:  [ ? ]  open-vm-tools
==> default:  [ ? ]  pppd-dns
==> default:  [ ? ]  rc.local
==> default:  [ ? ]  screen-cleanup
==> default:  [ ? ]  sendsigs
==> default:  [ ? ]  umountfs
==> default:  [ ? ]  umountnfs.sh
==> default:  [ ? ]  umountroot
==> default:  [ ? ]  virtualbox-guest-x11
The following SSH command responded with a non-zero exit status.
Vagrant assumes that this means the command failed!

chmod +x /tmp/vagrant-shell && /tmp/vagrant-shell

Stdout from the command:



Stderr from the command:

stdin: is not a tty
our-node-app: unrecognized service
 [ ? ]  apport
 [ ? ]  console-setup
 [ ? ]  cryptdisks
 [ ? ]  cryptdisks-early
 [ ? ]  dns-clean
 [ ? ]  irqbalance
 [ ? ]  killprocs
 [ ? ]  kmod
 [ ? ]  networking
 [ ? ]  ondemand
 [ ? ]  open-vm-tools
 [ ? ]  pppd-dns
 [ ? ]  rc.local
 [ ? ]  screen-cleanup
 [ ? ]  sendsigs
 [ ? ]  umountfs
 [ ? ]  umountnfs.sh
 [ ? ]  umountroot
 [ ? ]  virtualbox-guest-x11

      

        
        
        
      

    

Then I found that Ubuntu would still switch to the format systemd

: but it was announced back in February 2014, and so I would think that the latest version of Ubuntu has already switched (or is it just me an idiot, not estimating how long it can such a change lasts).

Thinking that I would have to use this Upstart format, I started reading it, but unfortunately I was unable to figure out how to convert my script systemd

to Upstart format.

This leaves me wondering if anyone else had this problem, and if so, how did they solve it (did you switch to a different version of Ubuntu that supports systemd

or rewrote your service to use the Upstart format)?

Do you have any tips (or good resources) on how to convert your script systemd

to Upstart format?

Any help on this issue would be greatly appreciated; as I mentioned in the beginning, I am not an expert in system / server operations and therefore I am going to cover it here.

Thank you.

Refresh

I found this and seem to have misunderstood the difference between systemd

, init.d

and upstart

. Thus, systemd

this is a new system that improves init.d

and upstart

.

The article link explains how to install systemd

along with upstart

and then switch to systemd

, but am I still getting an error when I try to mount a VM?

I have updated my repo code .