diff --git a/docs/changelog/7.x.x.txt b/docs/changelog/7.x.x.txt
index 6fcbf1f4c..2eabdbc83 100644
--- a/docs/changelog/7.x.x.txt
+++ b/docs/changelog/7.x.x.txt
@@ -1,4 +1,5 @@
 7.7.19
+ - fixed #10822: spectre pid sucks
  - fixed #10817: Datatable not internationalized
  - fixed #10816: Minor Capitalization Issue
  - fixed #10814: matrix translations
diff --git a/docs/gotcha.txt b/docs/gotcha.txt
index e2a969aa9..a6b70c879 100644
--- a/docs/gotcha.txt
+++ b/docs/gotcha.txt
@@ -41,16 +41,20 @@ save you many hours of grief.
       will cause an error during the 7.6.32 upgrade.  Later versions
       of these modules should work.
 
-    * Spectre now works like many other programs and writes a PID
-      file.  The location of that file is required to be in your
-      spectre.conf file:
+    * Spectre now works like many other programs and uses a PID
+      file.  By default, it will use /var/run/spectre.pid, but you
+      can change that in your spectre.conf file:
 
 # The location of the file that keeps track of the master spectre
 # processId.
-"pidFile" : "/var/run/spectre.pid",  ##or /data/wre/var/logs, or someplace else
+"pidFile" : "/data/wre/var/logs/spectre.pid",
 
       After installing this version, you will need to manually kill
-      spectre, but it can be started again through the spectre script.
+      spectre:
+
+      killall spectre.pl
+
+      before starting it again.
 
     * The Default Gallery Album View Thumbnails template has been reworked
       to get rid of intermittent rendering bugs with IE7.  The thumbnail
diff --git a/sbin/spectre.pl b/sbin/spectre.pl
index 2781ff067..1bdf3d10c 100755
--- a/sbin/spectre.pl
+++ b/sbin/spectre.pl
@@ -71,7 +71,8 @@ if ($shutdown) {
     local $/;
     my $pidFileName = $config->get('pidFile');
     if (! $pidFileName) {
-        die "No pidFile specified in spectre.conf\n";
+        warn "No pidFile specified in spectre.conf, trying /var/run/spectre.pid\n";
+        $pidFileName = '/var/run/spectre.pid';
     }
     open my $pidFile, '<', $pidFileName or
         die "Unable to open pidFile ($pidFileName) for reading: $!\n";
@@ -101,6 +102,11 @@ elsif ($run) {
 }
 elsif ($daemon) {
     my $pidFileName = $config->get('pidFile');
+    ##Write the PID file
+    if (! $pidFileName) {
+        warn "No pidFile specified in spectre.conf.  Trying /var/run/spectre.pid instead\n";
+        $pidFileName = '/var/run/spectre.pid';
+    }
     if (!ping()) {
         die "Spectre is already running.\n";
     }
@@ -111,10 +117,6 @@ elsif ($daemon) {
     require POSIX;
     fork and exit;
     POSIX::setsid();
-    ##Write the PID file
-    if (! $pidFileName) {
-        die "No pidFile specified in spectre.conf\n";
-    }
     open my $pidFile, '>', $pidFileName or
         die "Unable to open pidFile ($pidFileName) for writing: $!\n";
     chdir "/";