inetd-util-pmb

Scripts to help run (and debug) programs via (x)inetd socket activation. Optimized for Node.js but also works with Perl, Python, mostly anything.

Socket activation

Annoyed of systemd for having to use two separate files (.socket and .service)? Or jealous that your Ubuntu Precise or Trusty doesn't yet support systemd?

Just use xinetd. Although many bad tutorials claim you couldn't use wait=yes with TCP, indeed you can. What makes those authors think it doesn't work is that your server doesn't get a peer socket as stdio, but instead gets the server socket as stdin – exactly what your script's net.Server wants to listen on!

As for debugging, xinetd isn't as helpful as it could be, though. The scripts in this package aim to help with that.

Setup

All examples assume that you install this package into a directory /usr/lib/node_modules/inetd-util-pmb. A symlink is fine, too.

Getting started

If you're new to xinetd, start with the included example service:

1. Copy docs/example/hello_nodejs_world to /etc/xinetd.d
2. Open the copy in your favorite editor.
3. Run bin/debug-xinetd.sh in one terminal,
4. and rlwrap netcat -vvvv localhost 1336 in another one.
5. After very few seconds, you should be greeted with Hello Node.js World!
6. In the xinetd debug terminal, press Enter to stop it, then q to quit the log viewer (less).
7. Future versions may even come with an example service that uses socket activation.

Scripts

• debug-xinetd: Capture output from xinetd -d, then help kill it.
• logwrap: Run and debug node scripts inside a xinetd service.

Known issues

• Needs more/better tests and docs.

License

ISC