Systemd Playground

A simple playground repository for learning how to run and manage Linux services using systemd. The goal of this project is not to build a production-ready application, but to understand the fundamentals of:

• Creating a systemd service unit
• Managing services with systemctl
• Viewing logs with journalctl
• Organizing deployment-related files inside a repository

Project Structure

.
├── bin/
│   └── hello-world
├── etc/
│   └── systemd/
│       └── system/
│           └── hello-world.service
├── go.mod
├── main.go
└── readme.md

Directory Overview

Path	Description
main.go	Sample Go application
bin/	Compiled binaries
etc/systemd/system/	Systemd unit files managed inside the repository
readme.md	Project documentation

Application

The sample application:

• Starts an HTTP server
• Returns Hello World
• Writes a log message every 5 seconds

This application exists only to provide a process that can be managed by systemd.

How to create a unit systemd service

Build the application

Compile the application:

go build -o bin/hello-world .

Check the application working correctly

Run it manually:

./bin/hello-world

Copy a service configuration into /etc/systemd/system/

sudo cp etc/systemd/system/hello-world.service /etc/systemd/system/

Copy binaries file to /usr/local/bin/hello-world

sudo cp bin/hello-world /usr/local/bin/hello-world

Copy env file

sudo cp /path-to-your-project/.env /etc/default/hello-world

Reload daemon

sudo systemctl daemon-reload

Start the service

sudo systemctl start hello-world

Check the service status

sudo systemctl status hello-world

Learning Objectives

After completing this playground, you should understand:

• What a systemd service is
• How Linux services are started and supervised
• How automatic restart policies work
• How to inspect service logs