www.nico.schottelius.org/software/cinit.mdwn

cinit is a fast, small and simple init with support for profiles

## Why should I use cinit?

 * To significant speedup the startup process
 * To use highest level of parallelisation at startup
 * To benefit from real dependencies (so called ***needs*** and ***wants***)
 * To easily create profiles that can be chosen at startup (even **before** init is started!)

## How does cinit work?

Cinit creates a dependency tree at startup and executes the services.
A service can have two type of dependencies:

 * ***wants*** describe soft dependencies (i.e. it's not fatal if the wanted service fails to start)
 * ***needs*** describe hard dependencies (if the needed service fails, the depending won't be started)

Let's have a look at an example:

    
                    A
                 (wants)
                /       \
     |------> B \        C
     |       /   \      /  \
     ^  (needs)   (needs)   (wants)
     |    D          E        F
     |                        |
     |------<------(needs)----|
    

Or in words:

 * B and C do not have dependencies
  * They will be started at the beginning
 * A wants B and C
   * A waits until B and C are executed and started afterwards,
     independently of the success of B and C
   * A will also be started, if B and C fail to start.
 * D needs B
  * D will only be started, if B is successfully started
 * E needs B and C
  * E will only be started, if both B and C are successfully started
 * F wants C and needs B
  * F will only be started, if B is successfully started
  * F waits until C is started and is started afterwards

## Getting cinit

### Development versions
You can get the latest (development) version via git:

    git clone git://git.schottelius.org/cLinux/cinit.git

Additionally, the following other git ressources are available:

 * [Gitweb](http://git.schottelius.org/?p=cLinux/cinit.git;a=summary).
 * [Mirror at github](http://github.com/telmich/cinit)


### Archives

 * [[cinit-0.3pre15.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre15.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre15/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre15/doc/changes/0.3pre15]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre14.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre14.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre14/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre14/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre13.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre13.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre13/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre13/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre12.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre12.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre12/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre12/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre11.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre11.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre11/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre11/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre10.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre10.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre10/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre10/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre9.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre9.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre9/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre9/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre8.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre8.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre8/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre8/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre7.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre7.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre7/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre7/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre6.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre6.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre6/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre6/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre5.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre5.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre5/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre5/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre4.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre4.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre4/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.3pre4/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.3pre3.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre3.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre3/))
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 * [[cinit-0.3pre2.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre2.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre2/))
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 * [[cinit-0.3pre1.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.3pre1.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.3pre1/))
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 * [[cinit-0.2.1.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.2.1.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.2.1/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.2.1/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.2.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.2.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.2/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.2/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.1.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.1.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.1/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.1/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.0.8.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.0.8.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.0.8/))
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 * [[cinit-0.0.7.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.0.7.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.0.7/))
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 * [[cinit-0.0.6.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.0.6.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.0.6/))
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 * [[cinit-0.0.5.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.0.5.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.0.5/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.0.5/CHANGES]]
 * [[cinit-0.0.4.tar.bz2|archives/cinit-0.0.4.tar.bz2]]
   ([browse source](browse_source/cinit-0.0.4/))
   [[changes|browse_source/cinit-0.0.4/CHANGES]]

## Support

### Documentation 

The documentation is currently spread all over the ***doc/*** directory
within the tarball and is being cleaned up. Additionally there
are two presentations available:

  * [[2005-10-22: (German) speech at Technophil|software/cinit/speeches/2005-10-22]]
  * [[2005-08-06: (German) online speech|software/cinit/speeches/2005-08-06]]

### Mailing list
There is a general
[cinit mailing list](http://l.schottelius.org/mailman/listinfo/cinit) available.

### IRC
You can join the development ***IRC channel***
[#cLinux on irc.freenode.org](irc://irc.freenode.org/#cLinux).

## Related websites

 * BSD init systems (same codebase):
  * <a href="http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/cvsweb.cgi/src/sbin/init/">FreeBSD</a>,
  * <a href="http://cvsweb.netbsd.org/bsdweb.cgi/src/sbin/init/">NetBSD</a>,
  * <a href="http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/sbin/init/">OpenBSD</a>
 * <a href="http://www.initng.org/">initng</a>
 * <a href="http://www.fefe.de/minit/">minit</a>
 * <a href="http://smarden.org/runit/">runit</a>
 * <A HREF="http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~rgooch/linux/boot-scripts/">simpleinit</a>
 * <a href="ftp://ftp.cistron.nl/pub/people/miquels/sysvinit/">sysvinit</a>
 * <A HREF="http://www.netsplit.com/blog/work/canonical/upstart.html">upstart</A>


[[!tag unix]]