[systemd-devel] Using systemd as a session manager

[Kay Sievers]

On Mon, Jan 9, 2012 at 21:29, Alessandro Delgado <adelgado1313 at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 9, 2012 at 2:51 PM, Kay Sievers <kay.sievers at vrfy.org> wrote:
>>
>> On Mon, Jan 9, 2012 at 17:44, Alessandro Delgado <adelgado1313 at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>> > I would like to know if anybody knows something on using systemd as a
>> > session manager. What I mean as a session manager is something
>> > responsable
>> > for having some programs that I'd like to be running under certain
>> > circumpstances run under those. (e.g. nm-applet,  xfcce4-power-manager,
>> > gnome-sound-applet etc.)
>> >
>> > The solution I use right now is to either put those on my .xinitrc or
>> > start
>> > those using the methods of whichever environment I happen to be using. I
>> > tend to use minimalistic window managers with many small programs to use
>> > as
>> > envionment, so that means scripting.
>> >
>> > It is sub-optimal for several reasons:
>> >
>> > a) Sometimes if you restart your window manager you get several
>> > instances of
>> > notification icons
>> > b) If you plug a new monitor on the computer sometimes the same effect
>> > happens
>> > c) If any of the programs halt, they won't restart automatically
>> > d) They are started as a shell spawn, serially, which can feel extremely
>> > slow, instead of in parallel
>> >
>> > This is also fact with applications that I want to autostart, such as
>> > Firefox, Liferea, Pidgin, terminal etc.
>> >
>> >
>> > Basically, I would like to know is: If there is a clean way to do this
>> > in
>> > systemd? Is it meant for it in some way or not even considered?
>> >
>> > P.S. Of course, I run systemd as my init system; I'm thinking
>> > aditionally to
>> > that.
>>
>> We have 'systemd --user', which is supposed to run for every logged-in
>> user, but not for every session. We do not really, and do not plan, to
>> support running the same stuff twice for the same user.
>>
>> So far we did not really implement anything advanced for --user, and
>> did not even thing everything through. It might happen in a few
>> months, no specific plans so far, we are currently too busy to get the
>> --system stuff working.
>>
>> Kay
>
>
> Is there some way to build a target/service in such a way that it is only
> available when systemd is called with --user flag?
>
> I don't know of any other piece of software that accounts for these needs,
> but I'd apreciate ideas, though.
>
> It seems systemd, even if it needed modifications, would be rather fit for
> this purpose.

'User units' go into their own user/ directory, not in system/, so
they do not need to be made conditional -- if that's what you meant.

Kay