How to automatically start a service when running a docker container

Question

I have a Dockerfile to install MySQL server in a container  which I then start like this   sudo docker run -t -i 09d18b9a12be  bin bash   But the MySQL service does not start automatically  I have to manually run  from within the container    service mysql start   How do I automatically start the MySQL service when I run the docker container

User · Answer

docker export -o  lt nameOfContainer gt  tar  lt nameOfContainer gt    Might need to prune the existing container using docker prune       Import with required modifications   cat  lt nameOfContainer gt  tar   docker import -c  ENTRYPOINT service mysql start  amp  amp   bin bash  -  lt nameOfContainer gt    Run the container for example with always restart option to make sure it will auto resume after host daemon recycle   docker run -d -t -i --restart always --name  lt nameOfContainer gt   lt nameOfContainer gt   bin bash   Side note  In my opinion reasonable is to start only cron service leaving container as clean as possible then just modify crontab or cron hourly   daily etc    with corresponding checkup monitoring scripts  Reason is You rely only on one daemon and in case of changes it is easier with ansible or puppet to redistribute cron scripts instead of track services that start at boot

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Simple  Add at the end of dockerfile   ENTRYPOINT service mysql start  amp  amp   bin bash

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I add the following code to  root  bashrc to run the code only once   Please commit the container to the image before run this script  otherwise the  docker services  file will be created in the images and no service will be run   if     -e  var run docker services    then     echo  Starting services      service mysql start     service ssh start     service nginx start     touch  var run docker services fi

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In my case  I have a PHP web application being served by Apache2 within the docker container that connects to a MYSQL backend database  Larry Cai s solution worked with minor modifications  I created a entrypoint sh file within which I am managing my services  I think creating an entrypoint sh when you have more than one command to execute when your container starts up is a cleaner way to bootstrap docker      bin sh  set -e  echo  Starting the mysql daemon  service mysql start  echo  navigating to volume  var www  cd  var www echo  Creating soft link  ln -s  opt mysite mysite  a2enmod headers service apache2 restart  a2ensite mysite conf a2dissite 000-default conf service apache2 reload  if   -z   1    then     exec   usr sbin apache2 -D -foreground  else     exec   1  fi

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Here is how I automatically start the MySQL service whenever the docker container runs   On my case  I need to run not just MySQL but also PHP  Nginx and Memcached  I have the following lines in Dockerfile  RUN echo  daemon off    gt  gt   etc nginx nginx conf EXPOSE 80 EXPOSE 3306 CMD service mysql start  amp  amp  service php-fpm start  amp  amp  nginx -g  daemon off    amp  amp  service memcached start  amp  amp  bash   Adding  amp  amp  bash would keep Nginx  MySQL  PHP and Memcached running within the container

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This not works CMD  service mysql start  amp  amp   bin bash   This not works CMD service mysql start    bin bash     -- i guess interactive mode would not support foreground    This works     CMD service nginx start   while true   do sleep 100  done   This works     CMD service nginx start  amp  amp  tail -F  var log nginx access log  beware you should using docker run  -p 80 80 nginx bash without command parameter

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I have the same problem when I want to automatically start ssh service  I found that append  etc init d ssh start to     bashrc can resolve it  but only you open it with bash will do

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There s another way to do it that I ve always found to be more readable  Say that you want to start rabbitmq and mongodb when you run it then your CMD would look something like this  CMD  etc init d rabbitmq-server start  amp  amp         etc init d mongod start  Since you can have only one CMD per Dockerfile the trick is to concatenate all instructions with  amp  amp  and then use   for each command to start a new line  If you end up adding to many of those I suggest you put all your commands in a script file and start it like  larry-cai suggested  CMD  start sh

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The following documentation from the Docker website shows how to implement an SSH service in a docker container  It should be easily adaptable for your service    https   docs docker com engine examples running ssh service    A variation on this question has also been asked here    Start sshd automatically with docker container

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First  there is a problem in your Dockerfile   RUN service mysql restart  amp  amp   tmp setup sh   Docker images do not save running processes  Therefore  your RUN command executes only  during docker build phase and stops after the build is completed   Instead  you need to specify the command when the container is started using the CMD or ENTRYPOINT commands like below   CMD mysql start   Secondly  the docker container needs a process  last command  to keep running  otherwise the container will exit stop  Therefore  the normal service mysql start command cannot be used directly in the Dockerfile   Solution  There are three typical ways to keep the process running     Using service command and append non-end command after that like tail -F  CMD service mysql start  amp  amp  tail -F  var log mysql error log    This is often preferred when you have a single service running as it makes the outputted log accessible to docker     Or use foreground command to do this  CMD  usr bin mysqld safe    This works only if there is a script like mysqld safe    Or wrap your scripts into start sh and put this in end  CMD  start sh    This is best if the command must perform a series of steps  again   start sh should stay running   Note  For the beginner using supervisord is not recommended  Honestly  it is overkill   It is much better to use single service   single command for the container   BTW  please check https   registry hub docker com for existing mysql docker images for reference

User · Answer

In your Dockerfile  add at the last line  ENTRYPOINT service ssh restart  amp  amp  bash   It works for me  And this is the result   root ubuntu  home vagrant docker add  docker run -i -t ubuntu    Restarting OpenBSD Secure Shell server sshd     OK                                                                         root dccc354e422e    service ssh status    sshd is running

[docker] How to automatically start a service when running a docker container?

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