Start App Service At BootUp On JailBroken IOS Device

This post is for Jail Broken devices and tested on IOS 8.1.2.

To start an application or service everytime on device boot up just follow these simple steps:

1 Install OpenSSH on your jailbroken device (through Cydia).

2 Write a boot script for your application or service. This can be anything as simpler as a bash script or anything that launches your app.

3 Write a plist for application. An example plist for application is:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple Computer//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "https://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
        <key>Label</key>
        <string>com.example.BackgroundService</string>
        
        <key>ProgramArguments</key>
        <array>
        <string>/path/to/program/eg/bin/bash</string>
        <string>path/to/launchscript/eg/root/BackgroundService</string>
        </array>
        
        <key>RunAtLoad</key>
        <true/>

        <key>StandardErrorPath</key>
        <string>/var/logs/BackgroundService.log</string>
        
        <key>StandardOutPath</key>
        <string>/tmp/BackgroundService.log</string>
</dict>
</plist>

You can name it anything for example com.example.BackgroundService.plist

4 Copy the plist file to /Library/LaunchDaemons/ directory.

5 Load the plist using:

$ launchctl load /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.example.BackgroundService.plist

That’s it ! Now every time you boot up the device your service will start running automatically.

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