[Doc-Holiday]

My community has always been ran on windows however we wanted to start learning how to do things on linux also in case we ever decide to switch.

So Here are my questions

1. Which Distro would be best? (was told ubuntu for beginers)
2. Is there a script/program that will monitor and restart my server per crash
3. Does '-autoupdate' actually restart the server when the screen is closed?
4. If i use ubuntu there are two options 12.10 support for 5 months... 12.04 LTS support for about 4 more years. Which would you recommend.. they say the LTS builds might have hardware compatibility for a while until they update.

[Powerlord]

1. Ubuntu and CentOS seem to be the popular server distros. Having said that, CentOS requires some additional steps due to having SELinux installed by default; it prevents srcds from running if you don't install .
2. srcds_run will auto-restart a server if its just crashed. However, if the server hangs instead of crashing, it won't do anything. Maybe someone else has another program they'd recommend.
3. "screen" is the magic word. There is a program named screen that allows you to keep a program running in a virtual terminal even if you're not logged in. -autoupdate will restart a server as long as the server has users on it when the update is pushed. There's a tool named nemrun for Linux servers that will auto-update a server whenever a server update happens regardless of the player count. I usually use its option to install the update before rebooting the server as Linux doesn't lock open files.
4. I tend to stick with the LTS releases (which come out every 2 years). 12.04 is the current LTS release.

[Doc-Holiday]

Thanks yeah I saw some shell scripts that say if the "screen" stops running it will restart it.. Im assuming each server instance i run needs its own terminal window?

[asherkin]

Originally Posted by Powerlord 1. Ubuntu and CentOS seem to be the popular server distros. Having said that, CentOS requires some additional steps due to having SELinux installed by default; it prevents srcds from running if you don't install .

Latest versions of Ubuntu have the same issue.

[Doc-Holiday]

Originally Posted by asherkin Latest versions of Ubuntu have the same issue.

Thanks I think we will be doing 12.o4.

Now to learn how to use the shell scripts lol and what not research research research. Lol. I've been spoiled with windows .exe's for 15 years makes me 7 lol

[Powerlord]

Originally Posted by Doc-Holiday Thanks yeah I saw some shell scripts that say if the "screen" stops running it will restart it.. Im assuming each server instance i run needs its own terminal window?

You can use screen to multiplex multiple terminals into one window. Once you have screen running, Ctrl-A, C creates a second window that you can then switch between with Ctrl-A, N (for next) and Ctrl-A, P (for previous).

On a side note, you need to detach from screen to keep it running in the the background. This is done via Ctrl-A, D.

If you ever forget, all commands in screen are prefixed with Ctrl-A. I assume this is because no common Linux programs used Ctrl-A when screen was written.

It's also possible to start a second window in an existing screen via the command line, but I don't remember what it is. I tend to run my servers in separate named screen sessions and connect to them via screen -rx tf2-1 and screen -rx tf2-2

[Doc-Holiday]

Originally Posted by Powerlord You can use screen to multiplex multiple terminals into one window. Once you have screen running, Ctrl-A, C creates a second window that you can then switch between with Ctrl-A, N (for next) and Ctrl-A, P (for previous). On a side note, you need to detach from screen to keep it running in the the background. This is done via Ctrl-A, D. If you ever forget, all commands in screen are prefixed with Ctrl-A. I assume this is because no common Linux programs used Ctrl-A when screen was written. It's also possible to start a second window in an existing screen via the command line, but I don't remember what it is. I tend to run my servers in separate named screen sessions and connect to them via screen -rx tf2-1 and screen -rx tf2-2

Ok thanks. More to look at.

[Doc-Holiday]

ok so going GUI i didnt need to use screen.

I wrote a script that names and starts all of my servers ( in their own named terminal window. And wrote a script that kills the processs lol in turn closing the servers..

now just need a way of automating the start script on boot.. tried cron and the built in start applications and neither worked. Cron added it in to

/etc/crontab <-- sudo gedit /etc/crontab

@reboot username /home/username/start_all_servers.sh

on reboot doesnt do jack shit

[hamilton5]

Are you actually running cron? What happens if you type /home/username/start_all_servers.sh in a terminal as 'username' ?

[Doc-Holiday]

Originally Posted by hamilton5 Are you actually running cron? What happens if you type /home/username/start_all_servers.sh in a terminal as 'username' ?

It runs. Is as if cron isn't on