Debian services control panel

What is "Debian services control panel"?

This program is a small and simple tool that manages the available "services" in a Debian (or Debian-based)¹ box.

We define "services" as the programs that are in the /etc/init.d/ directory.

In fact, this program is a front-end for the update-rc.d tool.

You can start, stop and restart services. You can set (or unset) each service to be launched when booting the system.

Using the program

First of all: you must run the program as root, or vía sudo:

you@your-box $ sudo debian-srv-cp

Why?. This program makes and delete symbolic links in the directory /etc/, and this task only can be acheived by the superuser root.

The main window show several buttons: 'Start', 'Stop', 'Restart', 'Set default', 'Remove default' and 'Quit' and a list with all the available services. You have to select a service in the list and use the desired button.

Here is a screenshot:

Download and requeriments

You may download the a Debian package (.deb) and install it with this command:

dpkg -i debian-srv-cp.deb

This program has been developed using Gambas. Gambas is an IDE (Integrated Development Environment) for BASIC. A program written in Gambas needs a "Gambas runtime", like Java programs need a "Java runtime".

There are "official" gambas debian packages for "testing" and "unstable". You will need the package gambas-gb-qt (and its dependences, of course).

If you are curious or a Gambas programmer, you can download the program's source code.

Bugs

• If there is some corrupted file (broken link, empty file) in the /etc/init.d/ directory, the program will crash:
  In my system (KANOTIX 2005-03, a distro based on Debian sid and Knoppix), there was an invalid file called knoppix-terminalserver. I removed it and the program run without errors.

Contact

You can contact with the autor, David Asorey Álvarez, in this e-mail: forodejazz (at) gmail (dot) com

Notes

1. Debian based distributions: Knoppix, Kanotix, Ubuntu, ...