[Puppet Users] Puppet can''t start service (dropbox) but init.d command works manually

Richard K. Miller
2012-01-30T23:05:10Z

I''m using Dropbox''s command-line daemon on one of our machines
and
want to use Puppet to keep it running. The dropbox service is already
installed and allows me to successfully execute /etc/init.d/dropbox
[start/stop/restart/service]. Here''s my code:

class dropbox::service {
  service { "dropbox":
    ensure => running,
  }
}

I get the following syslog error when this runs:
(/Stage[main]/Dropbox::Service/Service[dropbox]/ensure) change from
stopped to running failed: Could not start Service[dropbox]: Execution
of ''/etc/init.d/dropbox start'' returned 1:  at
/etc/puppet/modules/
dropbox/manifests/init.pp:14

However, if I run the above command manually, it works fine and
returns 0:

root@webhost:~# /etc/init.d/dropbox start ; echo $?
Starting dropbox...
0

Any ideas why puppet can''t start the dropbox daemon?

Richard