Your First Project

This tutorial walks through setting up a project with multiple daemons managed by pitchfork.

Create a Configuration File

In your project root, create pitchfork.toml:

[daemons.api]
run = "npm run server:api"

[daemons.docs]
run = "npm run server:docs"

[daemons.redis]
run = "redis-server"

This defines three daemons: an API server, a docs server, and Redis.

Start Your Daemons

Start all daemons at once:

pitchfork start --all

Or start specific ones:

pitchfork start api redis

Check Status

View all running daemons:

pitchfork list

Output:

NAME   PID    STATUS
api    12345  running
docs   12346  running
redis  12347  running

Get detailed status for one daemon:

pitchfork status api

View Logs

See logs for a specific daemon:

pitchfork logs api

Follow logs in real-time:

pitchfork logs api --tail

View logs for multiple daemons:

pitchfork logs api docs

Stop Daemons

Stop a specific daemon:

pitchfork stop api

Stop all daemons:

pitchfork stop api docs redis

Restart on Changes

If a daemon is already running, pitchfork start does nothing. Use --force to restart:

pitchfork start api --force

Add Ready Checks

Make pitchfork wait until your daemon is actually ready:

[daemons.api]
run = "npm run server:api"
ready_http = "http://localhost:3000/health"

[daemons.redis]
run = "redis-server"
ready_output = "Ready to accept connections"

See Ready Checks for all options.

Enable Auto-Restart

Have pitchfork automatically restart daemons that crash:

[daemons.api]
run = "npm run server:api"
retry = 3  # Restart up to 3 times on failure

See Auto Restart for details.

What's Next?

• Shell Hook - Auto-start when entering project directories
• Ready Checks - Configure readiness detection
• Configuration Reference - All configuration options