Our staging server needed to be able to run multiple unicorns, each responsible for a different rails app, e.g. QA and staging I wanted a simple /etc/init.d script that will start/stop/reload all my unicorns or just a specific one: # starts all unicorns listed in /etc/unicorn/*.conf /etc/init.d/unicorn start # stops the QA unicorn /etc/init.d/unicorn stop /etc/unicorn/qa.conf The /etc/unicorn fi