The new systemctl edit command.

Among the changes coming with the RHEL 7.2 release, there is the new systemctl edit command.

Like the systemctl cat command, you specify a service unit file as argument. But, unlike the systemctl cat command, you will need to think twice before using it in a production environment. All successful editing converts into a service restart!

So, without any other argument than the unit file, you create or edit a drop-in snippet called override.conf that will complement the current service configuration. If necessary the associated service directory is created (for example /etc/systemd/system/httpd.service.d in the httpd case) which is pretty handy.

You need to set up one of the following environment variables before: SYSTEMD_EDITOR, EDITOR or VISUAL. If you don’t do it, the nano, vim, and vi editors will be tried one after the other.

If you add the –full option, it is now the service unit file that you are editing and not a drop-in snippet anymore.

Finally, you can use the –runtime option, if you want to make some changes to a service unit file in the /usr/lib/systemd/system directory and don’t want the change to survive a reboot (this doesn’t work if the unit file is located in the /etc/systemd/system directory because of precedence between /etc and /run).

This command is definitively a useful addition for speeding up the tuning of service unit files in a development environment.