Runit is a replacement for sysv-init and other init schemes. it runs on debian gnu/linux, *bsd, macosx, and solaris, and may be easily adapted to other unix operating systems. runit implements a simple three-stage concept. stage 1 performs the system's one-time initialization tasks. stage 2 starts the system's uptime services (via the runsvdir program). stage 3 handles the tasks necessary to shutdown and halt or reboot.

see http://smarden.org/runit/ for more information.

this package contains services directories for a collection of services available in debian, to have them run under runit service supervision instead of sysvinit or through init.d scripts. amongst other services, it includes service directories for apache, cron, dhclient, exim, gdm, postfix, squid, ssh.