insert a starting script to pimatic.js

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Hey there,

I dön’t know very much about scripts and the different types of those in linux. I need to start a programm every time pimatic starts. Is it possible to simply add a line (maybe after the version check of node js) of code to the pimatic.js with a link to a bash-script to be executed? @pimatic-team
I want already have a bash script starting socat to create a link between a serial device and my wifi-gateway for mysensors. This way it could start automated with every pimatic start or restart.

If you already have a executable script this should be very easy.
There is a rule trigger for “if pimatic starts” and with this Plugin you can simply execute scripts within pimatic rules.

Does this solve your question?

yeah but that starts the script after pimatic is running…
I need it to be executed before start of pimatic. My socat script creates the serial device and connects it to my wifi-gateway. When pimatic starts the mysensors plugin trys to connect to the serial device. In case it is not there it will not reconnect after it is available.

Put it in the service script ?

@Anduril said:

I need it to be executed before start of pimatic.

I don’t think this is supported by pimatic right now. So, may you can do this by adding it to the pimatic service wrapper as @koffienl suggested. Or may be even write a separate service wrapper for it as you see this as an independent service.

@koffienl what is the service script?

do you mean the init.d script? I already have this kind of script to start socat at reboot. But a problem occurs when restarting pimatic (maybe because of updates). Another problem is that sometimes the socat tunnel crashes and needs to be restarted. At the moment I simply do a complete reboot, only doing a pimatic restart would be much nicer.

See this: https://pimatic.org/guide/getting-started/autostarting/

edit : you could write a little service shell script that watch if pimatic is running, if it it is stopped kill the socat and start a new one ?

the problem is not killing socat, this will terminate on it’s own when pimatic closes it’s connection with the serial device. Problem is to reliable start it before pimatic in any case (reboot of pi, pimatic restart, pimatic updates,…). Therefor I thought the pimatic.js file would be perfect as it is the way pimatic is started all the time. Init.d script does not trigger when doing a reboot from gui (I think).

so seems that no one has another idea how to do it, but nobody realy responded to 'is it possible to start a script file from within pimatic.js?'
I’m not familiar with node and scripting in general, so any help is appreciated.

@Anduril
what if we turn it around: you start pimatic with the script you use to start the socal service with…
You build a loop that waits till the serial device responds in the script and after that you call the pimatic service.

that helps for doing the initial startup (but that’s already working with my script in init.d), but when using the frontend to restart pimatic (after update or new plugin installed) pimatic would just use it’s own script and socat would not start. That’s why I wanted to do it the other way around and include my socat start script into the things called when pimatic does a restart on it’s own.

Then make a buttons device in the frontend that runs a script to restart the socat and afterwards pimatic. Instead of using the “restart pimatic” button on the update page, use your own script button. Wouldn’t that be the easiest way out?

@DavidZH thanks a lot for pointing me to this idea, that’s indeed a nice and easy solution for my problem. I could also easily add a check if the socat tunnel was stable (sometimes it disconnects) and then run a restart by rules. I will have to test a litte, I will report back.