Restart Reactor option not working on QNAP docker

[d868]

Hi @toggledbits here is the thread to discuss the restart issue with MSR as discussed.

When I use the Tools > Restart Reactor button in the UI it shuts down reactor successfully but doesn't restart. It doesn't bother me as I can easily restart it manually via the docker UI, but thought it would be still worth posting it if anyone else has the same issue, or if you want to look into it.

I'm running MSR using the latest-generic-amd64 docker image on a QNAP NAS via the standard docker implementation (container station).

[toggledbits]

That tool can only stop MSR. It relies on the OS (or in this case, docker) to restart the container when it sees it has stopped.

Confirm that "Auto Start" is turned on for your container in its settings. This may not be enough for QNAP though. I did some Googling, and there is a lot of discussion going back some time that the UI for Container Station has no real equivalent for docker's "--restart" option to set the restart policy for the container. Users suggest starting up the container from the command line (once you've done it once, it sticks in docker's configuration).

See:

• https://forum.qnap.com/viewtopic.php?t=143609
• https://www.reddit.com/r/qnap/comments/agsnc6/container_station_autorestart_after_unexpected/
• https://docs.docker.com/config/containers/start-containers-automatically/

Ugh. This makes QNAP/Container Station much more difficult (higher learning curve, more exotic commands required to get started). That puts it (way) down my list for recommended platforms.

[d868]

Ah, now that I know the button is just shutting down MSR and not trying to actually restart it that explains what's happening. I haven't had much luck with the auto start even though it's turned on so I just do a manual restart when needed. Thanks for suggesting some links, but don't worry about looking into it any further. I'm not worried about it, but it's good to have it documented here if anyone else comes across it in the future.

Might be handy to add something to the documentation about what the button actually does when you get to updating the Tools section.

[toggledbits]

The thing is, it works correctly on Synology, or under other docker installations, because the restart policy can be defined. This is a QNAP limitation, so the fact that it doesn't work on QNAP (specifically Container Station UI) is all that's to be documented, and if the links are to be believed, using the command line to create and start the container rather than Container Station, it then works fine. It would be good to have confirmation of that.

[d868]

If I get some time I'll test it for you and let you know via this thread, but I've made a point with this NAS of not doing anything in the command line because I want to keep it as out of the box and standard as possible. I know it's not hard, but my last NAS was basically all command line and a lot of tweaking which made for some interesting times during some upgrades so this time I'm keeping it all standard and working around any limitations.

For the documentation I wasn't suggesting you document specific issues with platforms, just what the button actually does which would help anyone in the future if they were wondering what was happening. It maybe just me, but I wouldn't have bothered to ask about this if I'd realised that the restart was an OS thing, not part of the button function. Eg: The restart reactor button shuts down reactor (or the container) and the OS is then responsible for automatically restarting MSR using whatever specific method is supported.

Anyway, coming from Reactor on Vera I'm very happy with MSR so far and this was just a suggestion.

[Tom_D]

Nice to know that "Restart Reactor" under tools shuts Reactor down and then relies on the host to restart it. Nice to know that QNAP is not behaving. I restart on the QNAP GUI after I make configuration changes. I am using QNAP because it is what I have so this would be good info for someone looking for a NAS to run Reactor on.