1. Go to the commandline
2. aptitude update
3. aptitude install tofrodos nano
4. Log in as root or use su and continue with 4. Alternative minus using the su in front of each command.
su [ Enter root password ]
4. Alternative using su
su nano /etc/init.d/rtorentdaemon

This will open the text editor nano if installed to create and edit this file /etc/init.d/rtorentdaemon

Place the contents from above into the file and edit these lines to match the user you plan to run rtorrent as.

user=”usernamerunningrtorrent”

config=”/home/usernamerunningrtorrent/.rtorrent.rc”

base=”/home/usernamerunningrtorrent”

An example of this file “config=”/home/usernamerunningrtorrent/.rtorrent.rc”” can be retrieved here.

http://libtorrent.rakshasa.no/browser/trunk/rtorrent/doc/rtorrent.rc?rev=latest

Copy it from the website into a Linux editor and save. Don’t download directly since it was create with Windows it will bomb with lines break issues. You can use the dos2unix command to convert it if you download the file directly like this.

dos2unix /home/usernamerunningrtorrent/.rtorrent.rc

#!/bin/bash

### BEGIN INIT INFO

# Provides:       rtorrent

# Required-Start:  $network 

# Required-Stop:   $network 

# Default-Start:   2 3 4 5

# Default-Stop:    0 1 6

# Short-Description: Start rtorrent as a daemon

### END INIT INFO

#!/bin/sh

#############

######

#############

# This script depends on screen.

# For the stop function to work, you must set an

# explicit session directory using ABSOLUTE paths (no, ~ is not absolute) in your rtorrent.rc.

# If you typically just start rtorrent with just "rtorrent" on the

# command line, all you need to change is the "user" option.

# Attach to the screen session as your user with 

# "screen -dr rtorrent". Change "rtorrent" with srnname option.

# Licensed under the GPLv2 by lostnihilist: lostnihilist _at_ gmail _dot_ com

##############

######

##############

#######################

##Start Configuration##

#######################

# You can specify your configuration in a different file 

# (so that it is saved with upgrades, saved in your home directory,

# or whateve reason you want to)

# by commenting out/deleting the configuration lines and placing them

# in a text file (say /home/user/.rtorrent.init.conf) exactly as you would

# have written them here (you can leave the comments if you desire

# and then uncommenting the following line correcting the path/filename 

# for the one you used. note the space after the ".".

# . /etc/rtorrent.init.conf

#Do not put a space on either side of the equal signs e.g.

# user = user 

# will not work

# system user to run as

user="usernamerunningrtorrent"

# the system group to run as, not implemented, see d_start for beginning implementation

# group=`id -ng "$user"`

# the full path to the filename where you store your rtorrent configuration

config="/home/usernamerunningrtorrent/.rtorrent.rc"

# set of options to run with

options=""

# default directory for screen, needs to be an absolute path

#base="/home/${user}"

base="/home/usernamerunningrtorrent"

# name of screen session

srnname="rtorrent"

# file to log to (makes for easier debugging if something goes wrong)

logfile="/var/log/rtorrentInit.log"

#######################

###END CONFIGURATION###

#######################

PATH=/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/sbin

DESC="rtorrent"

NAME=rtorrent

DAEMON=$NAME

SCRIPTNAME=/etc/init.d/$NAME

checkcnfg() {

	exists=0

	for i in `echo "$PATH" | tr ':' '\n'` ; do

		if [ -f $i/$NAME ] ; then

			exists=1

			break

		fi

	done

	if [ $exists -eq 0 ] ; then

		echo "cannot find rtorrent binary in PATH $PATH" | tee -a "$logfile" >&2

		exit 3

	fi

	if ! [ -r "${config}" ] ; then 

		echo "cannot find readable config ${config}. check that it is there and permissions are appropriate" | tee -a "$logfile" >&2

		exit 3 

	fi 

	session=`getsession "$config"` 

	if ! [ -d "${session}" ] ; then

		echo "cannot find readable session directory ${session} from config ${config}. check permissions" | tee -a "$logfile" >&2

		exit 3

	fi

}

d_start() {

  [ -d "${base}" ] && cd "${base}"

  stty stop undef && stty start undef

  su -c "screen -ls | grep -sq "\.${srnname}[[:space:]]" " ${user} || su -c "screen -dm -S ${srnname} 2>&1 1>/dev/null" ${user} | tee -a "$logfile" >&2

  # this works for the screen command, but starting rtorrent below adopts screen session gid

  # even if it is not the screen session we started (e.g. running under an undesirable gid

  #su -c "screen -ls | grep -sq "\.${srnname}[[:space:]]" " ${user} || su -c "sg \"$group\" -c \"screen -fn -dm -S ${srnname} 2>&1 1>/dev/null\"" ${user} | tee -a "$logfile" >&2

  su -c "screen -S "${srnname}" -X screen rtorrent ${options} 2>&1 1>/dev/null" ${user} | tee -a "$logfile" >&2

}

d_stop() {

	session=`getsession "$config"`

	if ! [ -s ${session}/rtorrent.lock ] ; then

		return

	fi

	pid=`cat ${session}/rtorrent.lock | awk -F: '{print($2)}' | sed "s/[^0-9]//g"`

	if ps -A | grep -sq ${pid}.*rtorrent ; then # make sure the pid doesn't belong to another process

		kill -s INT ${pid}

	fi

}

getsession() { 

	session=`awk '/^[[:space:]]*session[[:space:]]*=[[:space:]]*/{print($3)}' "$config"`

	echo $session

}

checkcnfg

case "$1" in

  start)

	echo -n "Starting $DESC: $NAME"

	d_start

	echo "."

	;;

  stop)

	echo -n "Stopping $DESC: $NAME"

	d_stop

	echo "."

	;;

  restart|force-reload)

	echo -n "Restarting $DESC: $NAME"

	d_stop

	sleep 1

	d_start

	echo "."

	;;

  *)

	echo "Usage: $SCRIPTNAME {start|stop|restart|force-reload}" >&2

	exit 1

	;;

esac

exit 0

Thanks to this guide, I’m one step closer to fire and forget. Thanks!