Auto-login user to TTY on boot, and then auto-run command within GNU screen

Question

Ubuntu 14.04.5 LTS

Desired functionality: Remote Ubuntu server boots and automatically starts an ongoing process as a specified user. I can then log in remotely at a later time and view the past and current screen output of the ongoing process.

Current plan:

Automated steps:

1. User "ubuntu" is logged in automatically to a terminal (TTY) on boot:

   "sudo nano /etc/init/tty1.conf"
   
   Change: exec /sbin/getty -8 38400 tty1
   
   To: exec /sbin/getty --autologin ubuntu -8 38400 tty1
   

2. User "ubuntu" runs GNU screen:

   screen -d -m -S screenname
   

3. User "ubuntu" runs the ongoing process within GNU screen:

   screen -S screenname -p 0 -X stuff "command^M"
   

Manual steps at later time:

4. I log in remotely as user "ubuntu" in another terminal (TTY).

5. I re-attach to the GNU screen session started in step 2:

   screen -r
   

6. I am able to view past and current output of the process started in step 3.

Questions:

• Is this the most effective way to achieve the desired outcome?
• How can the commands in step 2 & 3 be automated?
• How can the commands in step 2 & 3 not activate when I log in manually in step 4?

Answer 1

Answers (to my own questions)

• Is this the most effective way to achieve the desired outcome?
  I am still unsure if the solutions below are the most effective, but I can confirm that it at least works on the stated version on Ubuntu.
• How can the commands in step 2 & 3 be automated?
  

• How can the commands in step 2 & 3 not activate when I log in manually in step 4?
  
  Step one
  I put the following at the bottom of the .profile file in the user directory of the user being automatically logged in during step 1 above (/home/ubuntu/.profile):

  pgrep processname || /home/ubuntu/processscript.sh
  

  When the user is automatically logged in, this command will execute automatically because it is in .profile. The first part of the command (before the "||" checks if 'processname' is already running. If not, it will execute the second part of the command (after the "||") i.e. "processscript.sh" ... If 'processname' is already running, it won't.
  
  This check was necessary as the process I wanted to run could not have multiple instances running at the same time. In addition, it solves the problem of process running a second time when I log in manually later.
  
  Step two
  Create a shell script file called "processscript.sh" with the following contents:

  #!/bin/bash
  screen -d -m -S screenname &&
  screen -S screenname -p 0 -X stuff "/home/ubuntu/command.sh^M"
  

  Ensure "processscript.sh" is in the /home/ubuntu directory, and that it is executable with the command:

  chmod 744 processscript.sh
  

  The above shell script creates a screen instance with the name "screenname", and if completed successfully, it stuffs the commandline of that screen instance with the command "command.sh" with a carriage return (which is what the "^M" at the end does).
  
  Step three
  In the previous step, I encountered some problems when stuffing a command with attributes to the screen commandline (I think some character escaping was required). To resolve this simply, I added the full command with attributes to a shell script and used that instead. Therefore, create another shell script (as above) called "command.sh" and add the full command in there.