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Claude Skill: Linux Service

This page provides a downloadable Claude Code skill that automates installing the Spck CLI (spck) as a systemd service on Linux. With the skill installed, you can ask Claude Code to "run spck as a service" and it will check your environment, generate a correct unit file with your absolute paths, install it, and verify it is running — without you copy-pasting commands from a checklist.

The skill encodes the same systemd setup described in Using Tmux → Alternative: Linux Service, plus the pre-flight checks and failure-mode diagnostics that are easy to miss when writing the unit file by hand.

Download

Download the skill file and save it to your local Claude Code skills directory:

mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills/spck-cli-service
curl -fsSL https://docs.spck.io/assets/skills/spck-cli-service/SKILL.md \
  -o ~/.claude/skills/spck-cli-service/SKILL.md

Or download manually: SKILL.md — place it at ~/.claude/skills/spck-cli-service/SKILL.md.

What the Skill Does

When invoked, the skill walks Claude Code through the full install:

  1. Verifies the host is Linux running systemd.
  2. Resolves the absolute path to spck (avoids the PATH mismatch that breaks ExecStart).
  3. Warns if node is installed via nvm — those paths change on every Node upgrade and silently break the unit.
  4. Confirms ~/.spck-editor/.credentials.json exists (the CLI must be configured interactively at least once before running as a service).
  5. Picks between a user service (systemctl --user, no sudo) and a system service based on your needs.
  6. Writes the unit file with your real paths filled in — no placeholders.
  7. Runs daemon-reload, enable --now, then tails the journal to confirm the CLI connected to the relay server.

The skill also documents the seven most common failure modes (wrong ExecStart path, missing credentials, permission errors on the project directory, restart loops hitting start-limit-hit, stale nvm paths after npm upgrade, etc.) so Claude Code can diagnose a broken service instead of just regenerating the unit file.

Installation

Step 1 — Download the skill file:

mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills/spck-cli-service
curl -fsSL https://docs.spck.io/assets/skills/spck-cli-service/SKILL.md \
  -o ~/.claude/skills/spck-cli-service/SKILL.md

Step 2 — Verify Claude Code picked it up:

claude /skills

You should see spck-cli-service in the list. If not, restart Claude Code so it rescans the skills directory.

Claude Desktop loads skills from the same ~/.claude/skills/ directory on macOS and Linux. On Windows, the path is %USERPROFILE%\.claude\skills\ — but the skill itself only works on Linux hosts, so install it on the machine you want to run spck on, not on the machine running Claude Desktop.

If you are managing a remote Linux server, run Claude Code over SSH on that server (or via the Spck CLI terminal, which exposes a full shell to the server). Installing the skill on a local Mac will not help configure a remote Linux service.

Usage

Once installed, invoke the skill by asking Claude Code in plain language. Examples that will trigger it:

  • "Install spck as a systemd service"
  • "Make the Spck CLI start on boot"
  • "My spck-cli.service keeps restarting, can you debug it?"
  • "Run spck as a daemon so it survives my SSH disconnect"

Claude Code will read the skill, run the pre-flight checks (which will prompt you to approve each command), and then generate and install the unit file. Review each command before approving — particularly the ones that write to /etc/systemd/system/ under sudo.

What Gets Installed

The skill installs a single unit file. For a user service, that is:

~/.config/systemd/user/spck-cli.service

With contents like:

[Unit]
Description=Spck CLI Server
After=network-online.target
Wants=network-online.target

[Service]
Type=simple
WorkingDirectory=%h/your-project
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/spck
Restart=on-failure
RestartSec=5
StartLimitIntervalSec=60
StartLimitBurst=5

[Install]
WantedBy=default.target

For a system service, the file lives at /etc/systemd/system/spck-cli.service and adds User= and Group= directives. The skill picks the right variant based on your environment and writes the actual absolute paths into the file.

Why a Skill Instead of Copy-Paste?

The unit file in the tmux docs is a starting point, but several things have to be right for the service to actually work:

  • ExecStart must be the absolute path to spck. which spck inside a login shell will resolve PATH manipulations from .bashrc that systemd does not see.
  • If spck was installed under nvm, the path embeds the Node version — upgrading Node breaks the service silently until next reboot.
  • The CLI must have been run interactively at least once to create ~/.spck-editor/.credentials.json. A fresh service start with no credentials exits cleanly with no obvious error.
  • User= must own the WorkingDirectory, otherwise file-watch hits EACCES and the CLI restart-loops.
  • User services need loginctl enable-linger on headless servers, otherwise they only run while a login session is active.

The skill encodes all of this so you do not have to remember it.

Uninstall

Disable and remove the service:

systemctl --user disable --now spck-cli
rm ~/.config/systemd/user/spck-cli.service
systemctl --user daemon-reload

For a system service:

sudo systemctl disable --now spck-cli
sudo rm /etc/systemd/system/spck-cli.service
sudo systemctl daemon-reload

To remove the skill itself from Claude Code:

rm -rf ~/.claude/skills/spck-cli-service

See Also

  • AI Coding Agents on Mobile (ACP) — once the CLI is running as a service, this is what unlocks driving Claude Code (and Codex / Gemini) from your phone, with billing through your own Anthropic subscription rather than your Spck Editor quota.
  • Using Tmux — alternative approach using tmux for keeping the CLI alive across SSH disconnects.
  • Advanced Usage — full CLI command reference, configuration overrides, and multi-project setups.
  • Configuration — terminal, filesystem, security, and authentication settings the unit file does not cover.