What is the right way to run multiple processes from my start command?

Adam Mahar

Published April 26, 2019 12:21

The information in this post is accurate as of the published date April 26, 2019 12:21. Please make sure to check any linked documentation within the post for changes/updates.

I’ve read in the docs that I shouldn’t background a start process, as this will cause the supervisor process to start a second copy, but is it possible to run multiple processes from the start command? What is the right way to do this?

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  Larry

  May 15, 2019 17:05

  You cannot start multiple processes from the start command.

  If the process you start itself forks, that is fine provided that the parent process remains active and will terminate all children when it receives a sigterm message. Failure to do so will leave zombie processes lying around that may cause unexpected and unpredictable behavior. In that case, an off-the-shelf supervisor service is best as it is designed to do exactly that. This process is not recommended.

  In the vast majority of cases a background process of that sort is better handled using a worker container instead. See the documentation on how to configure one.

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  Matthias Van Woensel

  March 17, 2020 09:10

  Using a worker is the recommended way of starting more than one process. But if you are not able to use a worker and have no other way, it is technically possible to use supervisord to start multiple processes. Please only use this as a last resort.

  Example of running supervisord to run both PHP and dropboxd

  dependencies:
    python:
      supervisor: '*'
  
  web:
      commands:
          start: "supervisord -n -c supervisor.conf"
  

  supervisor.conf gets committed to the repository and looks like this:

  [supervisord]
  logfile=/tmp/supervisord.log
  nodaemon=true
  minfds=1024
  pidfile=/tmp/supervisord.pid
  
  [program:php]
  command=/usr/bin/start-php-app
  process_name=%(program_name)s
  autostart=true
  autorestart=true
  
  [program:dropbox]
  process_name=%(program_name)s
  command=/app/.dropbox-dist/dropboxd
  autostart=true
  autorestart=true
  

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