Setting up Auto-Restart (Windows)

Ways to setup auto restart for your bot on Windows hosts.

Using PM2 on Windows

Todo: https://github.com/jessety/pm2-installer

Using NSSM on Windows

To have the bot auto-restart on crash or system reboot, we will be using nssm by making a service for our bot application.

First, find the Python path of your Modmail pipenv by running pipenv shell and which python in your Modmail folder. Copy the path that appears in your terminal and paste it in the first line of our next step.

Second, create a file named modmail.bat in your modmail directory with the following contents, replacing python_path with the one you copied previously and python.exe with activate.bat:

call python_path
call python bot.py

The finished file should look something like this:

modmail.bat

call C:\Users\Raiden\.virtualenvs\modmail-oXWHQUly\Scripts\activate.bat
call python bot.py

Third, download nssm by clicking here and downloading the file under "Latest Release".

The download will be a .zip file so you'll need to extract it first using your file archiver program (such as WinRAR or 7-zip). After that, find nssm.exe in the folder corresponding to your OS bit version (these days it should be win64) and copy it's file path:

As nssm itself is only a command-line program, we'll need to use our trusty Terminal to use the application to create our service. So, search up "Powershell" in your start menu, right-click it and click "Run as Administrator".

Change directory (CD) into the folder path that you copied earlier, the command should look like something like this:

cd "C:\Users\Raiden\Downloads\nssm-2.24\win64"

Wrapping "your folder\directory" on Windows in double quotes is necessary to make sure spaces in our file path is parsed correctly.

And then, proceed to create a new service for Modmail using nssm with:

.\nssm install "Modmail"

A GUI will pop up where you can fill in the details needed for your Modmail service. Replace the Path with the path of your modmail.bat script and the Startup directory with the path of your Modmail folder as follow:

You can fill in these extra details as you see fit as it's only for your own reference:

You can also optionally specify a log file as output and error in the I/O tab, just be sure to create the file beforehand so you can select it in the GUI.

And finally, click "Install Service" to install your Modmail bot as a service on your Windows system.

By now you should have the service installed but not yet running. You can start it by using this command below in the open nssm Terminal from earlier:

.\nssm start modmail

You should be able to see your bot running if everything goes well. You can also verify the status of your Modmail service with:

.\nssm status modmail

And if you specified the log output file in your previous step, you should be able to see your current Modmail logs like so:

And that's it! Your bot will now auto-start everytime you reboot your system. You can also additionally stop and restart your service with .\nssm stop modmail and .\nssm restart modmail respectively. Refer to NSSM Documentation for further customization as this guide is only meant to cover the basic needs adequate for standard Modmail usage.