Can't start service without sudo

[omnigenous]

I need to run syncthing service as non-root because it's giving me warning:

"Syncthing should not run as a privileged or system user. Please consider using a normal user account."

And I can't access folder with all sync files with root.

I tried disabling service with root:
sudo dinitctl disable syncthing

Then run:
dinitctl enable syncthing
And I get this error:
"dinitctl: connecting to socket /home/USER/.dinitctl: No such file or directory"

Then created empty file:
touch ~/.dinitctl
Moved syncthing service:
mkdir ~/.config/dinit.d
sudo mv etc/dinit.d/syncthing ~/.config/dinit.d
dinitctl start syncthing
"dinitctl: connecting to socket /home/USER/.dinitctl: Connection refused"

So I didn't know what to put into that file and I looked at man pages saw only one mention of ~/.dinitctl and root equivalent would be /etc/dinitctl which doesn't exist on my system.

I saw #183 and #189 but it seems I got different issue and it could have been something I messed up while setting up dinit during install.
Is there step-by-step guide how to get dinitctl working without root?

[mobin-2008]

Hi.

I think you misunderstood about using dinit as service manager.
For running a service as any user than root you have these options:

1. Running your service in system instance of dinit. You should create a service for system instance of dinit in /etc/dinit.d/ or /lib/dinit.d/ or /usr/local/lib/dinit.d directory and set run-as option as your user:

   command = /usr/bin/my_daemon
   run-as = mobin
   ...

2. Running a user instance of dinit and put your service on it. You should create ~/.config/dinit.d and create boot service at threre and run dinit as your user by dinit & command. then put your services on ~/.config/dinit.d directory and start them with dinitctl without sudo and as your user: dinitctl start my_service. Full guide at https://github.com/davmac314/dinit/blob/master/doc/getting_started.md

Also dinit daemon for your user will be not ran by default and you need to run it manually. Take a look at #183

Regards

[omnigenous]

Thank you so much for detailed comment! I went with option 1 and edited /etc/dinit.d/syncthing file run-as line. I will read docs you linked to get better understanding once I get some sleep :D

[mobin-2008]

Your welcome 😁