Hi Guillem, On Thu, May 07, 2026 at 08:53:34PM +0200, Guillem Jover wrote: > On Sun, 2026-05-03 at 12:52:31 +0100, Andrew Bower wrote: > > On Wed, Nov 15, 2023 at 01:00:04PM +0100, Guillem Jover wrote: > > > On Tue, 2023-11-14 at 17:29:01 +1100, Craig Small wrote: > > > > The majority of usage of pidof is in init or pre/post scripts, which > > > > really > > > > should be using the LSB pidofproc function. That function in turn > > > > optionally uses pidof if the pidfile parameter is not given. That's > > > > probably a way forward for sometime in the future to not need > > > > procps-base > > > > Essential, but it is a way off. > > > > > > I think the status_of_proc function could be switched to use > > > start-stop-daemon (s-s-d) --status instead of pidofproc. To replace > > > pidof inside pidofproc I guess s-s-d could grow some option to print > > > the pid, I'd be happy to implement that. > > > > Thanks for this offer. > > > > I wonder if this might well be worth doing if, as it sounds, it is a low > > effort, low footprint change that simply allows any patch to swap out > > pidof usage with a capability that will always be available regardless > > of all else that happens in this transition? > > > > In the pecking order of resolutions to improve an initscript this would > > not be the first one I would go to but it would be handy to have in the > > arsenal and above adding a dependency on the 2M procps. > > > > Would this still be agreeable? > > I just checked now and it was really trivial. I'm undecided whether to > go with a new --print-pid command or an option to pass along the other > commands to print the PIDs matche. I'm attaching both patches, and will > be mulling over what feels like the better interface, before merging it > and after adding proper man page updates, for the next dpkg release.
Thank you so much for knocking up these patches! I literally just tried the first one, the new command, along with a pidof() emulation function in /lib/lsb/init-functions, as a transparent solution for all existing initscripts and it appeared to work very well! I see the MBF just went through so we can't refer to this approach in guidance but I think we might have a good way through here with this enhancement. Andrew
