How to use Linux software watchdog?

Question

Can anybody tell me the way to handle the software watchdog in Linux?

I have a program SampleApplication which runs continuously and that I got to restart it if its hangs or closes unexpectedly.

I was Googling about this and located Linux has watchdog at /dev/watchdog but don’t skills to use it. Could someone help me with an example?

My question is where to specify my application name and delay interval to restart?

Answer 1

Most of my Unix/Linux init programs will manage the daemons for you and restart them. Look into placing your service in /etc/inittab. Or you might be using Upstart or systemd.

All of those programs run as PID 1 and it's their job to watch and restart system processes.

From your Busybox tag, I might assume you're running an embedded system. On those, the System V style init scripts with all of their shell scripts are overkill. Probably rip all that out and replace it with a entries in /etc/inittab or upstart the systemd jobs.

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