1

I am trying to run a flask app which uses octave and python oct2py package to communicate with Octave. I setup an python venv and am running the app.

Simple flask app seems to work fine as in it accepts Post requests and responds back. When I try to add the octave functionality, the app works fine. With direct gunicorn binding, the app works fine too.

Problem starts when I try to create systemd service unit file and the code runs octave.

I created a service like /etc/systemd/system/my_project.service and it's content as below.

[Unit]
Description=Gunicorn instance to serve flask app
After=network.target

[Service]
User=some_user
Group=www-data
WorkingDirectory=/home/some_user/project_dir
Environment="PATH=/home/some_user/project_dir/venv/bin"
ExecStart=/home/some_user/project_dir/venv/bin/gunicorn --workers 3 --bind unix:project_dir.sock -m 007 wsgi:app

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

After looking at the status it throws error like

Error log

After restarting the service it throws 

gunicorn[1690]:     self.restart()
gunicorn[1690]:   File "/home/some_user/project_dir/venv/lib/python3.8/site-packages/oc>
gunicorn[1690]:     self._engine = OctaveEngine(stdin_handler=self._handle_stdin,
gunicorn[1690]:   File "/home/some_user/project_dir/venv/lib/python3.8/site-packages/oc>
gunicorn[1690]:     self.executable = self._get_executable()
gunicorn[1690]:   File "/home/some_user/project_dir/venv/lib/python3.8/site-packages/oc>
gunicorn[1690]:     raise OSError('octave-cli not found, please see README')
gunicorn[1690]: OSError: octave-cli not found, please see README
systemd[1]: my_project.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=1/FAILURE
systemd[1]: my_project.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.

I searched many places for the error but couldn't get it resolved like here here

And for octave I tried running octave and octave-cli from terminal with and without venv active and it opens octave so I am unable to figure out the exact cause.

If I directly run the command on terminal, it runs the app without any error

gunicorn --bind 127.1.0.1:5000 wsgi:app

wsgi.py file looks like this

from my_project import app

if __name__ == "__main__":
    app.run()

Any suggestion how to figure out this issue?

rand dev
  • 11
  • 2
  • `Environment="PATH=/home/some_user/project_dir/venv/bin"` You are overwriting your `PATH` here. You are supposed to do something like `PATH=/some/directory/bin:$PATH` when you want to extend your PATH. By overwriting it it will no longer find `octave-cli`. – Tin Nguyen Jun 18 '20 at 10:38
  • Thanks @TinNguyen for pointing the issue. Issue is due to PATH getting overwritten as you said. `PATH=/some_user/project_dir/bin:$PATH` doesn't seem to work with `systemd service` Environment. I am finding a solution to append environment variable now, will update once I get a solution. [Append environment variable](https://github.com/systemd/systemd/issues/9025) – rand dev Jun 18 '20 at 15:46

0 Answers0