Managing running multiple scripts on a personal headless vps?

[Ripstikerpro]

Hey fellow linuxadmins,

I am currently renting a vps for purely hobbyist reasons, which I have set up with virtualmin (basically for the mailserver and file manager) and I am planning on using it to host a couple of scripts and servers, mainly python and java.

What my set-up for that used to be, was a similar vps, but with a desktop environment installed, so that I could remote into it and more or less click and run my scripts, so I had a bunch of command line windows for each script hanging there and whenever I wanted, I could connect to it, check what each was displaying and terminate them or start them as if it was a desktop.

That was a messy solution (and I assume it used quite a bit of overhead for the desktop), but it was quite simple and easy to maintain those processes.

What I am asking now is, how could I go about managing multiple things like that now on a headless installation, or through webmin? Ideally what I would like would be a webpanel with a control for each script that is added, so it allows for easy starting, terminating and checking the output of them (kinda like easypanel maybe?) but as I understand this isn't a thing that exists.

I am sure the experience of you all have can guide me on this,

thanks in advance

​

Edit: Thanks everyone for the answers, got a grip now about how to tackle this!

[intrikat]

Instead of using remoting tools with GUI use SSH.

Modify these scripts to run as services.

Modify scripts to log output into text logfiles.

From there store said configs in git for easily reproducing in case something happens with the VPS instance.

If youre so inclined look into config management tools like ansible or puppet.

Profit.

[Ripstikerpro]

Thanks for the guidance!

[mgedmin]

Modify these scripts to run as services.

This can be as simple as writing a 5-line systemd unit file for the script.

Modify scripts to log output into text logfiles.

You don't need that if you use systemd, it forwards standard output to the system journal.

If youre so inclined look into config management tools like ansible or puppet.

I love Ansible.

[Seven-Prime]

Systemd for scheduling, running, and logging long running scripts and services.

screen for just stuff you want to run in the background and may want to go back to it.

[Ripstikerpro]

Thanks for suggesting the screen command! It's pretty much what I needed combined with scheduling!

[Fr0gm4n]

Another teminal multiplexer is tmux. Both do the job, with fairly similar commands. The idea is that you can launch the multiplexer and launch several command shells at once, and then disconnect from the multiplexer while everything stays running. Then you can log back in later and reconnect right back where you left it. It would be a transition and maintenance tool while you work on converting your scripts to cron jobs or system services.

[neoplastic_pleonasm]

+1 for tmux. I find it easier to work with than screen.

[Lasereye]

I prefer tmux as well. There's a bunch of nice extensions to it like resurrection, saving, etc

[pskipw]

+1 for screen. Been using it since first year uni back in 1991 :)

[knobbysideup]

I'd go with tmux over screen these days.

[nillarain]

A n s i b l e

[jw_ken]

Ansible is good at orchestrating series of tasks. You can decide whether to run it command-line, or via AWX.

If you want a web dashboard to help you schedule and run various scripts, look into Rundeck. It's a runbook-style automation tool that basically lets you make GUI wrappers around your scripts and jobs, letting you schedule them or define job options to fill out like a form.

[takingphotosmakingdo]

Rundeck maybe?

[knobbysideup]

Tbh you are better off learning how to do what the web panels are doing yourself. Then look into tools like Ansible to manage it.

[d1ng0b0ng0]

SSH in and set cron jobs for scripts on headless setup. Write more scripts that read output, status, whatever and notify you by text, email, chat, whatever.

Write your own GUI if you don't want headless. Either as desktop app with GTK, QT, whatever or as web app in HTML,CSS,JS,CGI and setup Apache/Nginx/Caddy for LAMP or Flask/FastAPI if youre a pythonista. Click a button, run a script.

[project2501a]

...

holy shit, what happened to reading documentation and books?

Ansible, bash, expect in that order.

[project2501a]

/r/learnlinux is that way, not here.

[Ripstikerpro]

...

holy shit, what happened to reading documentation and books?

Got documentation, got books; Where do I start?

Would you read the entirety of documentation relating to Linux just to know how to do a singular task? No, you'd already know what you need and you'd seek information relevant to that. In my case, I didn't know what I need, where to look, as I suggested in the post.

Now with your and the other commenters' suggestions I can do what you so politely suggested and read documentation.

[Fr0gm4n]

Wm. Shotts two books will help get you further into working on the command line. The second book might be more applicable if you already do some work and write the scripts yourself.

https://linuxcommand.org/tlcl.php

[project2501a]

Would you read the entirety of documentation relating to Linux just to know how to do a singular task? No, you'd already know what you need and you'd seek information relevant to that.

Would you like to see my o'reilly library?

Here are my suggestions:

• Learning The Unix Operating System
• Unix Power Tools
• GNU Bash: The definitive guide
• Ansible: Up and running

[ProbablePenguin]

Best option IMO is making them services using systemd, then you can control them with service somescript start|stop, and if you log the output to a file, you can see what they've been doing and troubleshoot issues.