Ah, the alert-tracks daemon needs to put itself into the background,

and write a pid file.

3 files changed, 24 insertions, 4 deletions

diff --git a/config/alert-tracks-debian.ugly b/config/alert-tracks-debian.ugly
index 8c2acdbb9..6dfa811a4 100644
--- a/config/alert-tracks-debian.ugly
+++ b/config/alert-tracks-debian.ugly
@@ -19,6 +19,8 @@ DUSER=!!(*= $user *)!!
 
 trap "" 1
 
+export PIDFILE
+
 case "$1" in
   start)
     echo -n "Starting WhatDoTheyKnow alert daemon: $NAME"
diff --git a/script/alert-tracks-daemon b/script/alert-tracks-daemon
index 7d3c2e4b5..9064eaa05 100755
--- a/script/alert-tracks-daemon
+++ b/script/alert-tracks-daemon
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
-#!/bin/bash
+#!/bin/sh
 
 LOC=`dirname $0`
 
-"$LOC/runner" 'TrackMailer.alert_tracks_loop'
+"$LOC/runner" --daemon TrackMailer.alert_tracks_loop
 
diff --git a/script/runner b/script/runner
index e6b09cfe5..c12421aa2 100755
--- a/script/runner
+++ b/script/runner
@@ -1,9 +1,27 @@
 #!/usr/bin/ruby
 
+daemon_mode = !ARGV.empty? && ARGV[0] == "--daemon"
+
 script_dir = File.dirname(__FILE__)
 alaveteli_dir = File.join(script_dir, "..")
 
 Dir.chdir(alaveteli_dir) do
-  require File.dirname(__FILE__) + '/../config/boot'
-  require 'commands/runner'
+  require File.join(alaveteli_dir, 'config', 'boot')
+  if daemon_mode
+    # Run in daemon mode.
+    #
+    # If the environment variable PIDFILE is present,
+    # write the pid of the daemon process to that file.
+    
+    pid = fork { require 'commands/runner' }
+    if ENV.has_key? "PIDFILE"
+      File.open(ENV["PIDFILE"], 'w') do |fh|
+        fh.puts pid
+      end
+    end
+    Process.detach(pid)
+  else
+    
+    require 'commands/runner'
+  end
 end