How do I...Run dekihost as a different user

Create the dekihost user

adduser --system dekihost 

Note: the --system option creates a user in the system UID range with no shell and logins disabled

Create the mono .wapi directory

mono requires a directory named .wapi in the home directory of the user running the mono process.  To create this directory do the following:

mkdir /home/dekihost/.wapi
chown dekihost /home/dekihost/.wapi 

Change ownership of the dekihost log file and pid file

chown dekihost /var/www/deki-api.log /tmp/deki-api.pid

Change the dekihost startup script to run using the dekihost user

Edit the following file:  /etc/init.d/dekihost

And change this line:

su www-data $DEKI_PATH/bin/mindtouch.host.sh start

to:

su -s /bin/bash -c "$DEKI_PATH/bin/mindtouch.host.sh start" dekihost

Then change:

su www-data $DEKI_PATH/bin/mindtouch.host.sh stop 

to:

su -s /bin/bash -c "$DEKI_PATH/bin/mindtouch.host.sh stop" dekihost

Then restart dekihost in order for the changes to take affect

/etc/init.d/dekihost restart