This document provides instructions for managing services on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 (RHEL 7) or CentOS 7 using the systemctl command. It lists common service management actions like start, stop, restart, enable, disable, mask, unmask and provides the corresponding systemctl commands. It also describes commands to check the status, activation state and failure state of a service.

1. How To Manage Services on RHEL 7 or CentOS 7
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Table of Contents
Overview.......................................................................................................................................................1
Applies To......................................................................................................................................................1
Pre-requisites................................................................................................................................................1
Service Management Table ......................................................................................................................1
Service Management Command Line...........................................................................................................2
Start Service..............................................................................................................................................2
Stop Service...............................................................................................................................................2
Restart Service ..........................................................................................................................................2
Enable Service...........................................................................................................................................3
Disable Service..........................................................................................................................................3
Mask Service .............................................................................................................................................3
Unmask Service.........................................................................................................................................4
Service Status............................................................................................................................................4
Service is-enabled.....................................................................................................................................5
Service is-active.........................................................................................................................................5
Service is-failed .........................................................................................................................................6

2. How To Manage Services on RHEL 7 or CentOS 7
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Overview
The purpose of this guide is to manage services on RHEL 7 or CentOS 7. Systemctl command is utilized to
manage services that are installed. In this guide we have considered Apache2 (httpd) service to be
managed.
Applies To
RHEL 7, CentOS 7
Pre-requisites
None
Service Management Table
Service
Management
Action
Purpose
start Start a service
stop Stop a service
restart Restart a service
enable Enable service to start at boot time
disable Disable service to start at boot time, can be started manually once the
system is online
status Check the current status of service
mask Prevent a service from starting dynamically or even manually until the
specific service is unmasked.
Mask will link service to /dev/null, making it impossible to start them.
It’s a stronger version of disable, since it prohibits all kinds of activation.
unmask Revoke masked service (undo already masked service)
is-enabled Check whether a service is already enabled state or not
is-active Check whether a service is active (running)
is-failed Check whether a service has failed (not running)

3. How To Manage Services on RHEL 7 or CentOS 7
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Service Management Command Line
Start Service
To start the service that’s is stopped or disabled to start at boot time, run the command;
systemctl start httpd
Stop Service
To stop the service that’s is already running, run the command;
systemctl stop httpd
Note: to know the service status is active / inactive, service should be in enabled state. otherwise the is-
active command will return “unknown” state
Restart Service
To stop and start the service specified, run the command;
systemctl restart httpd

4. How To Manage Services on RHEL 7 or CentOS 7
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Enable Service
In order to start the service so that the service starts at boot time enable service, run the command;
systemctl enable httpd
Disable Service
In order to disable the service so that service doesn’t start at boot time disable service, run the command;
systemctl disable httpd
Mask Service
In order to prohibit / restrict a service to be started manually or dynamically, run the command;
systemctl mask httpd

5. How To Manage Services on RHEL 7 or CentOS 7
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Unmask Service
To revoke mask of a service, run the command;
systemctl unmask httpd
Service Status
To check the status of a service, run the command;
systemctl status httpd

6. How To Manage Services on RHEL 7 or CentOS 7
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Service is-enabled
To check the if the service is enabled or not, run the command;
systemctl is-enabled httpd
Service is-active
To check the if the service is active or not, run the command;
systemctl is-active httpd
Note: to know the service status is active / inactive, service should be in enabled state. otherwise the is-
active command will return “unknown” state

7. How To Manage Services on RHEL 7 or CentOS 7
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Service is-failed
To check the if the service is failed state, run the command;
systemctl is-failed httpd
Note: To know the service status is active / failed, service should be enabled otherwise the is-failed
command will return “unknown” state