mjhjmtu

I have a systemd user service that works as expected. It is started like this:

systemctl start test@user

The problem is that I need to run this service on a timer possibly for multiple users. There doesn't seem to be a way to specify a user in the timer itself or a way to pass the username with the @ notation.

Here is the timer:

[Unit]
Description=Test (runs once every 24 hours)

[Timer]
OnUnitActiveSec=24h
Persistent=true
Unit=test@.service

[Install]
WantedBy=timers.target

What confuses me is what to put in the "Unit=".
If I put in "test@user.service" it works but then it will always run as a single user defeating the point of having a multi user service. Using "test@.service" starts the timer but "systemctl status test@user" shows it as always inactive even with timer set to 1min interval.

I am not sure how to list the all running instances of a given systemd service so I don't know if "test@" service is running as a different user when a timer runs the service without the "@user".

What is the proper way to start user services with a timer? Ideally users should be able to create and manage their own services as well as timers that go along those services.

Does that answer what you need?

systemctl --user start unit.service