InfluxDB failed to start as a service

Question

I'm trying to configure InfluxDB for Automatic start-up on a RHEL7 machine.

if I do:

sudo systemctl start influxdb

the service fails

[dadmin@localhost dashboard]$ sudo systemctl start influxdb
[sudo] password for dadmin: 
[dadmin@localhost dashboard]$ sudo systemctl status influxdb
● influxdb.service - InfluxDB is an open-source, distributed, time series database
   Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/influxdb.service; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
  Drop-In: /etc/systemd/system/influxdb.service.d
           └─override.conf
   Active: failed (Result: start-limit) since Thu 2017-05-11 13:16:29 CEST; 10s ago
     Docs: https://docs.influxdata.com/influxdb/
  Process: 2562 ExecStart=/usr/bin/influxd -config /dashboard/influxdb.conf ${INFLUXD_OPTS} (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)
 Main PID: 2562 (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)

May 11 13:16:29 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: influxdb.service: main process exited, code=exited, status=1/FAILURE
May 11 13:16:29 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: Unit influxdb.service entered failed state.
May 11 13:16:29 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: influxdb.service failed.
May 11 13:16:29 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: influxdb.service holdoff time over, scheduling restart.
May 11 13:16:29 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: start request repeated too quickly for influxdb.service
May 11 13:16:29 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: Failed to start InfluxDB is an open-source, distributed, time series database.
May 11 13:16:29 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: Unit influxdb.service entered failed state.
May 11 13:16:29 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: influxdb.service failed.

This is the unit file:

[dadmin@localhost dashboard]$ sudo systemctl cat influxdb.service
[sudo] password for dadmin: 
# /usr/lib/systemd/system/influxdb.service
# If you modify this, please also make sure to edit init.sh

[Unit]
Description=InfluxDB is an open-source, distributed, time series database
Documentation=https://docs.influxdata.com/influxdb/
After=network-online.target

[Service]
User=influxdb
Group=influxdb
LimitNOFILE=65536
EnvironmentFile=-/etc/default/influxdb
ExecStart=/usr/bin/influxd -config /etc/influxdb/influxdb.conf ${INFLUXD_OPTS}
KillMode=control-group
Restart=on-failure

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
Alias=influxd.service

# /etc/systemd/system/influxdb.service.d/override.conf
[Service]
ExecStart=
ExecStart=/usr/bin/influxd -config /dashboard/influxdb.conf ${INFLUXD_OPTS}

But if I execute directly

/usr/bin/influxd -config /dashboard/influxdb.conf

InfluxDB start smoothly.

Where am I wrong?

Answer 1

I found the problem:

[dadmin@localhost dashboard]$ sudo tail /var/log/messages
May 11 16:21:41 localhost influxd: [I] 2017-05-11T14:21:41Z Using data dir: /dashboard/influxdb/data service=store
May 11 16:21:41 localhost influxd: run: open server: open tsdb store: open /dashboard/influxdb/data/_internal: permission denied
May 11 16:21:41 localhost systemd: influxdb.service: main process exited, code=exited, status=1/FAILURE
May 11 16:21:41 localhost systemd: Unit influxdb.service entered failed state.
May 11 16:21:41 localhost systemd: influxdb.service failed.
May 11 16:21:41 localhost systemd: influxdb.service holdoff time over, scheduling restart.
May 11 16:21:41 localhost systemd: start request repeated too quickly for influxdb.service
May 11 16:21:41 localhost systemd: Failed to start InfluxDB is an open-source, distributed, time series database.
May 11 16:21:41 localhost systemd: Unit influxdb.service entered failed state.
May 11 16:21:41 localhost systemd: influxdb.service failed.

When I had executed

/usr/bin/influxd -config /dashboard/influxdb.conf

The folders had been created with dadmin as owner

I removed the folders and restarted the service. Now all works fine.

Answer 2

The config script does not have permissions.

It references directories. When you run /opt/influxdb/influxd config > /etc/opt/influxdb/influxdb.conf the outputted config file puts all the directories under ~. When you are root, ~ translates to /root.

If you don't want to use /root as your InfluxDB data directory there are a few options.

Run /opt/influxdb/influxd config > /etc/opt/influxdb/influxdb.conf as the user you want to run influxd. Then the config file will use that user's home directory as the install location. Explicitly edit /etc/opt/influxdb/influxdb.conf to reference the directories you want to use.

Also check this blog this might clear it out for you