NAME

       lxc-autostart - start/stop/kill auto-started containers

SYNOPSIS

       lxc-autostart [-k] [-L] [-r] [-s] [-a] [-A] [-g groups] [-t timeout]

DESCRIPTION

       lxc-autostart  processes  containers  with  lxc.start.auto  set.  It  lets the user start,
       shutdown, kill, restart containers in the right order, waiting the  right  time.  Supports
       filtering  by lxc.group or just run against all defined containers. It can also be used by
       external tools in list mode where no action will be performed and  the  list  of  affected
       containers (and if relevant, delays) will be shown.

       The [-r], [-s] and [-k] options specify the action to perform.  If none is specified, then
       the containers will be started.  [-a] and [-g] are used to specify which  containers  will
       be  affected.  By  default  only containers without a lxc.group set will be affected.  [-t
       TIMEOUT] specifies the maximum amount of time to wait for the container  to  complete  the
       shutdown or reboot.

OPTIONS

       -r,--reboot
              Request a reboot of the container.

       -s,--shutdown
              Request  a  clean  shutdown.  If  a  [-t  timeout]  greater than 0 is given and the
              container has not shut down within this period, it will be killed as with  the  [-k
              kill] option.

       -k,--kill
              Rather than requesting a clean shutdown of the container, explicitly kill all tasks
              in the container.

       -L,--list
              Rather than performing the action, just print the container name  and  wait  delays
              until starting the next container.

       -t,--timeout TIMEOUT
              Wait TIMEOUT seconds before hard-stopping the container.

       -g,--groups GROUP
              Comma  separated  list of groups to select (defaults to those without a lxc.group -
              the NULL group).  This option may be specified multiple  times  and  the  arguments
              concatenated. The NULL or empty group may be specified as a leading comma, trailing
              comma, embedded double comma, or empty argument where  the  NULL  group  should  be
              processed.   Groups  are  processed  in  the  order  specified on the command line.
              Multiple invocations of the -g option may  be  freely  intermixed  with  the  comma
              separated lists and will be combined in specified order.

       -a,--all
              Ignore lxc.group and select all auto-started containers.

       -A,--ignore-auto
              Ignore the lxc.start.auto flag. Combined with -a, will select all containers on the
              system.

AUTOSTART AND SYSTEM BOOT

       The lxc-autostart command is used as part of the LXC system service, when enabled  to  run
       on host system at bootup and at shutdown. It's used to select which containers to start in
       what order and how much to delay between each startup when the host system boots.

       Each container can be part of any number of groups or no group at  all.   Two  groups  are
       special. One is the NULL group, i.e. the container does not belong to any group. The other
       group is the "onboot" group.

       When the system boots with the LXC service enabled, it will  first  attempt  to  boot  any
       containers  with  lxc.start.auto  == 1 that is a member of the "onboot" group. The startup
       will be in order of lxc.start.order.  If an lxc.start.delay has been specified, that delay
       will  be  honored  before  attempting  to  start  the  next  container to give the current
       container time to begin initialization and  reduce  overloading  the  host  system.  After
       starting the members of the "onboot" group, the LXC system will proceed to boot containers
       with lxc.start.auto == 1 which are not members of any group (the NULL group)  and  proceed
       as with the onboot group.

STARTUP GROUP EXAMPLES

       -g "onboot,"
              Start the "onboot" group first then the NULL group.

              This is the equivalent of: -g onboot -g "".

       -g "dns,web,,onboot"
              Starts  the "dns" group first, the "web" group second, then the NULL group followed
              by the "onboot" group.

              This is the equivalent of: -g dns,web -g ,onboot or -g dns -g web -g "" -g onboot.

SEE ALSO

       lxc(7),  lxc-create(1),  lxc-copy(1),  lxc-destroy(1),  lxc-start(1),  lxc-stop(1),   lxc-
       execute(1),  lxc-console(1),  lxc-monitor(1),  lxc-wait(1), lxc-cgroup(1), lxc-ls(1), lxc-
       info(1), lxc-freeze(1), lxc-unfreeze(1), lxc-attach(1), lxc.conf(5)

AUTHOR

       Stéphane Graber <stgraber@ubuntu.com>

                                            2024-01-24                           lxc-autostart(1)