CentOS 6.5 - bash: service: command not found

So I can't type service on my CentOS 6.5 server. I'm logged in as root. When typing service I get this error:

bash: service: command not found

I have also tried to type sudo service, but with no luck. And then I get this error:

sudo: service: command not found

3 Answers

As discovered in the extended discussion through comments, your system is broken. I suggest reinstalling the system completely or at least the broken packages.

To have /sbin/service again run yum reinstall initscripts.

I don't recommend it, but if you want to reinstall all the packages that fail verification, run:

yum reinstall $(rpm -q --qf '%{NAME}\n' -a | while read rpm; do rpm -V $rpm >/dev/null || echo $rpm; done)

Take note that even a modified configuration file or changed mtime might trigger a reinstall. Though the new configuration files should come up with the .rpmnew extension if you changed the original.

The service command resides in the sbin directory - make sure it exists at /sbin/service

If you are root, then according to this mailing list, you may need to make sure it's on your path:Centos5 - Service Command Not Present.

You may also check out a similar function called chkconfig, since it can activate services as well. CentOS - chkconfig

The links attached are for CentOS 5, but they don't seem to differ in CentOS 6.5

I was able to fix this by adding /sbin to my PATH in CentOS 5.2

export PATH=$PATH:/sbin