I'm rolling my own initrd, and I'm trying to run a oneshot service in initrd just before the switch root happens. I added this unit to the initrd and enabled it. [Unit] Description=Test Unit Requires=initrd-fs.target After=initrd-fs.target [Service] Type=oneshot ExecStart=/bin/sh -c "echo hello" [Install] RequiredBy=initrd-switch-root.target The service does run, and I get "hello" in the journal, but then my /var mount doesn't mount. I'm having a hard time correlating the two seeming different things. The var.mount unit complains about a failed dependency. It's dependency is dev-disk-by\x2dpartlabel-varfs.device, which has no logs, is loaded, but inactive (dead). There is also a fsck dependency that is loaded, but inactive (dead). Without this simple oneshot service in initrd, everything works fine, fsck checks varfs and /var is mounted. Thoughts? Is there a better way to position a service to just before switch root?