<html><head></head><body>I build an mostly-stateless appliance OS derived from Fedora (25 ATM) and have several custom units to make it all possible. My units had worked great with F21, but are now giving me problems with F25. One pair of the custom units do some trickery to relocate sshd host keys from /etc/ssh to an alternate location that provides persistence: $ systemctl cat sshd-persist-keys.service # /usr/lib/systemd/system/sshd-persist-keys.service [Unit] Description=OpenSSH server - persist volatile keys for the AOS After=sshd-keygen.target Before=sshd.service Wants=sshd-keygen.target [Service] ExecStart=/usr/sbin/sshd-persist-keys Type=oneshot RemainAfterExit=yes [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target $ systemctl cat sshd-restore-keys.service # /usr/lib/systemd/system/sshd-restore-keys.service [Unit] Description=OpenSSH server - restore persisted keys for the AOS After=aos-storage-init.service <a href="mailto:Before=sshd-keygen@rsa.service" style="font-family: monospace;">Before=sshd-keygen@rsa.service</a> <a href="mailto:sshd-keygen@ecdsa.service" style="font-family: monospace;">sshd-keygen@ecdsa.service</a> sshd-keygen@ed 25519.service [Service] ExecStart=/usr/sbin/sshd-restore-keys Type=oneshot RemainAfterExit=yes [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target I found that on some boots, sshd wasn't getting started. With the help of booting with systemd.log_level=debug I learned: $ sudo journalctl | grep conflict Mar 22 16:11:42 localhost systemd[1]: sshd.service: Looking at job sshd.service/start conflicted_by=no Mar 22 16:11:42 localhost systemd[1]: sshd.service: Looking at job sshd.service/stop conflicted_by=yes Mar 22 16:11:42 localhost systemd[1]: sshd.service: Fixing conflicting jobs sshd.service/start,sshd.service/stop by deleting job sshd.service/start Mar 22 16:11:42 localhost systemd[1]: sshd.socket: Looking at job sshd.socket/stop conflicted_by=no Mar 22 16:11:42 localhost systemd[1]: sshd.socket: Looking at job sshd.socket/start conflicted_by=no Mar 22 16:11:42 localhost systemd[1]: sshd.socket: Fixing conflicting jobs sshd.socket/stop,sshd.socket/start by deleting job sshd.socket/stop Mar 22 16:11:42 localhost systemd[1]: sshd-keygen.target: Looking at job sshd-keygen.target/start conflicted_by=no Mar 22 16:11:42 localhost systemd[1]: sshd-keygen.target: Looking at job sshd-keygen.target/stop conflicted_by=no Mar 22 16:11:42 localhost systemd[1]: sshd-keygen.target: Fixing conflicting jobs sshd-keygen.target/start,sshd-keygen.target/stop by deleting job sshd-keygen.target/stop I'm sure systemd-analyze is my friend here, but I've not found an effective way to grok the problem. s-a dot either gives me too much to comprehend or not enough to make evident the problem. I've tried feeding it different PATTERNS like: none at all, sshd.service, ssh- keygen.target, sshd-{persist,restore}-keys.service and more. I either see a whole forest or just a few trees that seem to be getting along happily together. What advice can you suggest?</body></html>