launchd/src/launchd.plist.5

   1 .Dd September 30, 2004
   2 .Dt launchd.plist 5
   3 .Os Darwin
   4 .Sh NAME
   5 .Nm launchd.plist
   6 .Nd System wide and per-user daemon/agent configuration files
   7 .Sh DESCRIPTION
   8 This document details the parameters that can be given to an XML property list that can be loaded into
   9 .Nm launchd
  10 with
  11 .Nm launchctl .
  12 .Sh EXPECTATIONS
  13 Daemons or agents managed by
  14 .Nm launchd
  15 are expected to behave certain ways.
  16 .Pp
  17 A daemon or agent launched by
  18 .Nm launchd
  19 MUST NOT do the following in the process directly launched by
  20 .Nm launchd :
  21 .Pp
  22 .Bl -bullet -offset indent -compact
  23 .It
  24 .Xr fork 2
  25 and have the parent process
  26 .Xr exit 3
  27 or
  28 .Xr _exit 2 .
  29 .It
  30 Call
  31 .Xr daemon 3
  32 .El
  33 .Pp
  34 A daemon or agent launched by
  35 .Nm launchd
  36 SHOULD NOT do the following as a part of their startup initialization:
  37 .Pp
  38 .Bl -bullet -offset indent -compact
  39 .It
  40 Setup the user ID or group ID.
  41 .It
  42 Setup the working directory.
  43 .It
  44 .Xr chroot 2
  45 .It
  46 .Xr setsid 2
  47 .It
  48 Close "stray" file descriptors.
  49 .It
  50 Change
  51 .Xr stdio 3
  52 to /dev/null.
  53 .It
  54 Setup resource limits with
  55 .Xr setrusage 2 .
  56 .It
  57 Setup priority with
  58 .Xr setpriority 2 .
  59 .It
  60 Ignore the SIGTERM signal.
  61 .El
  62 .Pp
  63 A daemon or agent launched by
  64 .Nm launchd
  65 SHOULD:
  66 .Pp
  67 .Bl -bullet -offset indent -compact
  68 .It
  69 Launch on demand given criteria specified in the XML property list.
  70 More information can be found in
  71 .Xr launch 3 .
  72 .It
  73 Catch the SIGTERM signal.
  74 .El
  75 .Sh XML PROPERTY LIST KEYS
  76 The follow keys can be used to describe the configuration details of your daemon or agent.
  77 Property lists files are expected to have their name end in ".plist" but that is not strictly required.
  78 .Pp
  79 .Bl -ohang
  80 .It Sy Label <string>
  81 This required key uniquely identifies the job to
  82 .Nm launchd .
  83 .It Sy Disabled <boolean>
  84 This optional key is used to disable your job. The default is false.
  85 .It Sy UserName <string>
  86 This optional key specifies the user to run the job as. The default is the user who submitted the job to
  87 .Nm launchd .
  88 .It Sy GroupName <string>
  89 This optional key specifies the user to run the job as. The default is the group of the user who submitted the job to
  90 .Nm launchd .
  91 .It Sy inetdCompatibility <dictionary>
  92 The presence of this key specifies that the daemon expects to be run as if it were launched from
  93 .Xr inetd 8 .
  94 .Bl -ohang -offset indent
  95 .It Sy Wait <boolean>
  96 This flag corresponds to the "wait" or "nowait" option of
  97 .Xr inetd 8 .
  98 .El
  99 .It Sy ProgramArguments <array of strings>
 100 This required key maps to the second argument of
 101 .Xr execvp 3 .
 102 .It Sy Program <string>
 103 This optional key maps to the first argument of
 104 .Xr execvp 3 .
 105 If this key is missing, then the first element of the array of strings provided to the ProgramArguments will be used instead.
 106 .It Sy OnDemand <boolean>
 107 This optional key is used to control whether your job is launched based on demand or to be kept continuously running. The default is true.
 108 .It Sy RunAtLoad <boolean>
 109 This optional key is used to control whether your job is launched once at the time the job is loaded. The default is false.
 110 .It Sy RootDirectory <string>
 111 This optional key is used to specific a directory to
 112 .Xr chroot 2
 113 to before running the job.
 114 .It Sy WorkingDirectory <string>
 115 This optional key is used to specific a directory to
 116 .Xr chdir 2
 117 to before running the job.
 118 .It Sy ServiceDescription <string>
 119 This optional key is used to specify a human readable description of the purpose of the job.
 120 .It Sy EnvironmentVariables <dictionary of strings>
 121 This optional key is used to specify additional environmental variables to be setup before running the job.
 122 .It Sy Umask <integer>
 123 This optional key specifies what value should be passed to
 124 .Xr umask 2
 125 before running the job.
 126 .It Sy ServiceIPC <boolean>
 127 This optional key specifies whether the job participates in advanced communication with
 128 .Nm launchd .
 129 The default is false.
 130 .It Sy TimeOut <integer>
 131 The recommended time out to pass to the job. If no value is specified, a default time out will be supplied by
 132 .Nm launchd
 133 for use by the job at check in time.
 134 .It Sy InitGroups <boolean>
 135 This optional key specifies whether the job should have
 136 .Xr initgroups 3
 137 should be called before running the job.
 138 The default is false.
 139 .It Sy WatchPaths <array of strings>
 140 This optional key causes the job to be started if any one of the listed paths are modified.
 141 .It Sy QueueDirectories <array of strings>
 142 Much like the WatchPaths option, this key will watch the paths for modifications. The difference being that the job will only be started if the path is a directory and the directory is not empty.
 143 .It Sy StartInterval <integer>
 144 This optional key causes the job to be started every N seconds.
 145 .It Sy StartCalendarInterval <dictionary of integers>
 146 This optional key causes the job to be started every calendar interval as specified. Missing arguments are considered to be wildcard. The semantics are much like
 147 .Xr crontab 5
 148 .
 149 .Bl -ohang -offset indent
 150 .It Sy Minute <integer>
 151 The minute on which this job will be run.
 152 .It Sy Hour <integer>
 153 The hour on which this job will be run.
 154 .It Sy Day <integer>
 155 The day on which this job will be run.
 156 .It Sy Weekday <integer>
 157 The weekday on which this job will be run (0 and 7 are Sunday).
 158 .It Sy Month <integer>
 159 The month on which this job will be run.
 160 .El
 161 .It Sy StandardOutPath <string>
 162 This optional key specifies what file should be used for data being sent to stdout when using
 163 .Xr stdio 3 .
 164 .It Sy StandardErrorPath <string>
 165 This optional key specifies what file should be used for data being sent to stderr when using
 166 .Xr stdio 3 .
 167 .It Sy Debug <boolean>
 168 This optional key specifies that
 169 .Nm launchd
 170 should adjust its log mask temporarily to LOG_DEBUG while dealing with this job.
 171 .Xr stdio 3 .
 172 .It Sy SoftResourceLimits <dictionary of integers>
 173 .It Sy HardResourceLimits <dictionary of integers>
 174 Resource limits to be imposed on the job. These adjust variables set with
 175 .Xr setrlimit 2 .
 176 The following keys apply:
 177 .Bl -ohang -offset indent
 178 .It Sy Core <integer>
 179 The largest size (in bytes) core file that may be created.
 180 .It Sy CPU <integer>
 181 The maximum amount of cpu time (in seconds) to be used by each process.
 182 .It Sy Data <integer>
 183 The maximum size (in bytes) of the data segment for a process; this defines how far a program may extend its break with the
 184 .Xr sbrk 2
 185 system call.
 186 .It Sy FileSize <integer>
 187 The largest size (in bytes) file that may be created.
 188 .It Sy MemoryLock <integer>
 189 The maximum size (in bytes) which a process may lock into memory using the
 190 .Xr mlock 2
 191 function.
 192 .It Sy NumberOfFiles <integer>
 193 The maximum number of open files for this process.
 194 .It Sy NumberOfProcesses <integer>
 195 The maximum number of simultaneous processes for this user id.
 196 .It Sy ResidentSetSize <integer>
 197 The maximum size (in bytes) to which a process's resident set size may grow.
 198 This imposes a limit on the amount of physical memory to be given to a process;
 199 if memory is tight, the system will prefer to take memory from processes that
 200 are exceeding their declared resident set size.
 201 .It Sy Stack <integer>
 202 The maximum size (in bytes) of the stack segment for a process; this defines
 203 how far a program's stack segment may be extended.  Stack extension is
 204 performed automatically by the system.
 205 .El
 206 .It Sy Nice <integer>
 207 This optional key specifies what
 208 .Xr nice 3
 209 value should be applied to the daemon.
 210 .It Sy LowPriorityIO <boolean>
 211 This optional key specifies whether the kernel should consider this daemon to be low priority when doing file system I/O.
 212 .It Sy Sockets <dictionary of dictionaries...>
 213 This optional key is used to specify launch on demand sockets that can be used to let
 214 .Nm launchd
 215 know when to run the job. The job can check-in and get a copy of the file descriptors using APIs outlined in
 216 .Xr launch 3 .
 217 The paramters below are used as inputs to call
 218 .Xr getaddrinfo 3 .
 219 .Bl -ohang -offset indent
 220 .It Sy SockType <string>
 221 This optional key tells
 222 .Nm launchctl
 223 what type of socket to create. The default is "stream" and other valid values for this key
 224 are "dgram" and "seqpacket" respectively.
 225 .It Sy SockPassive <boolean>
 226 This optional key specifies whether
 227 .Xr listen 2
 228 or
 229 .Xr connect 2
 230 should be called on the created file descriptor. The default is true ("to listen").
 231 .It Sy SockNodeName <string>
 232 This optional key specifies the node to
 233 .Xr connect 2
 234 or
 235 .Xr bind 2
 236 to.
 237 .It Sy SockServiceName <string>
 238 This optional key specifies the service on the node to
 239 .Xr connect 2
 240 or
 241 .Xr bind 2
 242 to.
 243 .It Sy SockFamily <string>
 244 This optional key can be used to specifically request that "IPv4" or "IPv6" socket(s) be created.
 245 .It Sy SockProtocol <string>
 246 This optional key specifies the protocol to be passed to
 247 .Xr socket 2 .
 248 The only value understood by this key at the moment is "TCP".
 249 .It Sy SockPathName <string>
 250 This optional key implies SockFamily is set to "Unix". It specifies the path to
 251 .Xr connect 2
 252 or
 253 .Xr bind 2
 254 to.
 255 .It Sy Bonjour <boolean or string or array of strings>
 256 This optional key can be used to request that the service be registered with the
 257 .Xr mDNSResponder 8 .
 258 If the value is boolean, the service name is inferred from the SockServiceName.
 259 .El
 260 .El
 261 .Pp
 262 .Sh EXAMPLE XML PROPERTY LISTS
 263 .Pp
 264 The following XML Property List simply keeps "exampled" running continuously:
 265 .Pp
 266 .Dl <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
 267 .Dl <!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple Computer//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
 268 .Dl <plist version="1.0">
 269 .Dl <dict>
 270 .Dl     <key>Label</key>
 271 .Dl     <string>com.example.exampled</string>
 272 .Dl     <key>ProgramArguments</key>
 273 .Dl     <array>
 274 .Dl             <string>exampled</string>
 275 .Dl     </array>
 276 .Dl     <key>OnDemand</key>
 277 .Dl     <false/>
 278 .Dl </dict>
 279 .Dl </plist>
 280 .Pp
 281 .Sh FILES
 282 .Bl -tag -width "/System/Library/LaunchDaemons" -compact
 283 .It Pa ~/Library/LaunchAgents
 284 Per-user agents provided by the user.
 285 .It Pa /Library/LaunchAgents
 286 Per-user agents provided by the administrator.
 287 .It Pa /Library/LaunchDaemons
 288 System wide daemons provided by the administrator.
 289 .It Pa /System/Library/LaunchAgents
 290 Mac OS X Per-user agents.
 291 .It Pa /System/Library/LaunchDaemons
 292 Mac OS X System wide daemons.
 293 .El
 294 .Sh SEE ALSO
 295 .Xr launchctl 1 ,
 296 .Xr launch 3 ,
 297 .Xr launchd 8