DEB-SYSTEMD-HELPER(1p) init-system-helpers DEB-SYSTEMD-HELPER(1p)
NAME
deb-systemd-helper - subset of systemctl for machines not running
systemd
SYNOPSIS
deb-systemd-helper enable | disable | purge | mask | unmask | is-enabled
| was-enabled | debian-installed | update-state | reenable unit file ...
DESCRIPTION
deb-systemd-helper is a Debian-specific helper script which re-
implements the enable, disable, is-enabled and reenable commands from
systemctl.
The "enable" action will only be performed once (when first installing
the package). On the first "enable", a state file is created which will
be deleted upon "purge".
The "mask" action will keep state on whether the service was
enabled/disabled before and will properly return to that state on
"unmask".
The "was-enabled" action is not present in systemctl, but is required in
Debian so that we can figure out whether a service was enabled before we
installed an updated service file. See http://bugs.debian.org/717603 for
details.
The "debian-installed" action is also not present in systemctl. It
returns 0 if the state file of at least one of the given units is
present.
The "update-state" action is also not present in systemctl. It updates
deb-systemd-helper's state file, removing obsolete entries (e.g. service
files that are no longer shipped by the package) and adding new entries
(e.g. new service files shipped by the package) without enabling them.
deb-systemd-helper is intended to be used from maintscripts to enable
systemd unit files. It is specifically NOT intended to be used
interactively by users. Instead, users should run systemd and use
systemctl, or not bother about the systemd enabled state in case they
are not running systemd.
ENVIRONMENT
_DEB_SYSTEMD_HELPER_DEBUG
If you export _DEB_SYSTEMD_HELPER_DEBUG=1, deb-systemd-helper will
print debug messages to stderr (thus visible in dpkg runs). Please
include these when filing a bugreport.
DPKG_ROOT
Instead of working on the filesystem root /, perform all operations
on a chroot system in the directory given by DPKG_ROOT.
AUTHOR
Michael Stapelberg <stapelberg@debian.org>
1.69~deb13u1 2025-08-20 DEB-SYSTEMD-HELPER(1p)
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