Two's Complement Running Programs
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Sep 12, 2025 Matt and Ben dive into the nitty-gritty of running processes in production, tackling everything from screen sessions to systemd configurations. They provide entertaining insights into daemonization rituals and liken Ansible playbooks to bash scripts with a makeover. The challenges of deploying software in different environments spark engaging personal anecdotes. With a nod to Tolkien, they explore process hierarchies while highlighting the ease of using Systemd for modern service management. Plus, they discuss scaling applications and the modern shift to Ansible and Terraform.
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Screen Deployments Break Overnight
- Ben described deploying by SCP and running a process inside screen, then losing it by accidentally detaching.
- The hosts joked that
Processes Are Children Of Your Shell
- Matt and Ben explained process parentage: your process is child of bash, sshd, then init/systemd.
- They recount closing a laptop and the remote sshd cleaning up sessions, which kills the child processes.
Background Processes Need Proper Redirection
- When backgrounding via &, redirect stdout, stderr, and stdin to safe places to avoid terminal-tied failures.
- Use no-hup or disown and ensure file descriptors aren't connected to your SSH session before disconnecting.