Start a script or dev server automatically at Windows login

Windows has two usual ways to start something at login: a shortcut in your Startup folder (press Win+R, type shell:startup, press Enter), or a Task Scheduler task with an “At log on” trigger. Either one runs a program or script, which could be your dev server’s command directly, but then nothing tracks it, shows its output or stops it for you.

What Moonpool offers

Moonpool has no start-at-login setting, and an entry in apps.json has no field that launches it when Moonpool starts (the full list is in App fields and settings.json). What you can do is start Moonpool at login yourself, then have a script launch the apps you want, using the same verb the command line offers.

First register the app as usual:

apps.json

{
  "id": "site",
  "name": "Site",
  "group": "Web apps",
  "type": "web",
  "cwd": "C:\\code\\site",
  "command": "npm run dev",
  "port": 5173,
  "url": "http://localhost:5173"
}

Then save this as start-moonpool-apps.ps1. Installed, the program is %USERPROFILE%\.moonpool\moonpool.exe; for a portable copy use the path of that copy’s exe.

start-moonpool-apps.ps1

$mp = "$env:USERPROFILE\.moonpool\moonpool.exe"
Start-Process $mp
Start-Sleep -Seconds 15
& $mp launch site

Moonpool must already be running for launch to be handed to it; run with nothing resident, the same command starts a new Moonpool and the verb is not carried out. The delay gives it time to start, so raise it on a slow machine. Add one & $mp launch <id> line per app.

Finally put a shortcut to the script in the Startup folder, with this target:

Shortcut target

powershell.exe -NoProfile -WindowStyle Hidden -File "C:\Users\you\start-moonpool-apps.ps1"

To check what happened, add --ticket t1 to a verb and read the result from state.json (Reading the outcome).

Caveats

• A dev server started this way is “managed” by Moonpool like any other, so Stop and Quit work on it. If the same app is already running (started by hand, say), Moonpool shows it as running but not managed.
• Moonpool does not relaunch an app that exits, and does not remember which apps were running when you last quit.

See also

• Command line
• Tray, close and minimize
• Run an npm dev server in the background on Windows