Start Seafile at System Bootup¶

For systems running systemd and python virtual environments¶

For example Debian 12 Create systemd service files, change ${seafile_dir} to your seafile installation location and seafile to user, who runs seafile (if appropriate). Then you need to reload systemd's daemons: systemctl daemon-reload.

Firstly, you should create a script to activate the python virtual environment, which goes in the ${seafile_dir} directory. Put another way, it does not go in "seafile-server-latest", but the directory above that. Throughout this manual the examples use /opt/seafile for this directory, but you might have chosen to use a different directory.

sudo vim /opt/seafile/run_with_venv.sh

The content of the file is:

#!/bin/bash
# Activate the python virtual environment (venv) before starting one of the seafile scripts

dir_name="$(dirname $0)"
source "${dir_name}/python-venv/bin/activate"
script="$1"
shift 1

echo "${dir_name}/seafile-server-latest/${script}" "$@"
"${dir_name}/seafile-server-latest/${script}" "$@"

make this script executable

sudo chmod 755 /opt/seafile/run_with_venv.sh

Seafile component¶

sudo vim /etc/systemd/system/seafile.service

The content of the file is:

[Unit]
Description=Seafile
# add mysql.service or postgresql.service depending on your database to the line below
After=network.target

[Service]
Type=forking
ExecStart=bash ${seafile_dir}/run_with_venv.sh seafile.sh start
ExecStop=bash ${seafile_dir}/seafile-server-latest/seafile.sh stop
LimitNOFILE=infinity
User=seafile
Group=seafile

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Seahub component¶

sudo vim /etc/systemd/system/seahub.service

The content of the file is:

[Unit]
Description=Seafile hub
After=network.target seafile.service

[Service]
Type=forking
ExecStart=bash ${seafile_dir}/run_with_venv.sh seahub.sh start
ExecStop=bash ${seafile_dir}/seafile-server-latest/seahub.sh stop
User=seafile
Group=seafile

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

For systems running systemd without python virtual environment¶

For example Debian 8 through Debian 11, Linux Ubuntu 15.04 and newer

Create systemd service files, change ${seafile_dir} to your seafile installation location and seafile to user, who runs seafile (if appropriate). Then you need to reload systemd's daemons: systemctl daemon-reload.

Seafile component¶

sudo vim /etc/systemd/system/seafile.service

The content of the file is:

[Unit]
Description=Seafile
# add mysql.service or postgresql.service depending on your database to the line below
After=network.target

[Service]
Type=forking
ExecStart=${seafile_dir}/seafile-server-latest/seafile.sh start
ExecStop=${seafile_dir}/seafile-server-latest/seafile.sh stop
LimitNOFILE=infinity
User=seafile
Group=seafile

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Seahub component¶

Create systemd service file /etc/systemd/system/seahub.service

sudo vim /etc/systemd/system/seahub.service

The content of the file is:

[Unit]
Description=Seafile hub
After=network.target seafile.service

[Service]
Type=forking
ExecStart=${seafile_dir}/seafile-server-latest/seahub.sh start
ExecStop=${seafile_dir}/seafile-server-latest/seahub.sh stop
User=seafile
Group=seafile

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Seafile cli client (optional)¶

Create systemd service file /etc/systemd/system/seafile-client.service

You need to create this service file only if you have seafile console client and you want to run it on system boot.

sudo vim /etc/systemd/system/seafile-client.service

The content of the file is:

[Unit]
Description=Seafile client
# Uncomment the next line you are running seafile client on the same computer as server
# After=seafile.service
# Or the next one in other case
# After=network.target

[Service]
Type=oneshot
ExecStart=/usr/bin/seaf-cli start
ExecStop=/usr/bin/seaf-cli stop
RemainAfterExit=yes
User=seafile
Group=seafile

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Enable service start on system boot¶

sudo systemctl enable seafile.service
sudo systemctl enable seahub.service
sudo systemctl enable seafile-client.service   # optional