Sycronizing/deploying scripts across several systems
- by otto
I have a few time consuming tasks that I like to spread across several computers. These tasks require running an identical ruby or python script (or series of scripts that call each other) on each machine. The machines will a separate config file telling the script what portion of the task to complete.
I want to figure out the best way to syncronize the scripts on these machines prior to running them. Up until now, I have been making changes to a copy of the script on a network share and then copying a fresh copy to each machine when I want to run it. But this is cumbersome and leaves a chance for error ( e.g missing a file on the copy or not clicking "copy and replace").
Lets assume the systems are standard windows machines that are not dedicated to this task and I don't need to run these scripts all the time (so I don't want a solution that runs 24/7 and always keeps them up to date, I'd prefer something that pushes/pulls on command).
My thoughts on various options:
Simple adaptation of my current workflow: Keep the originals on the network drive, but write a batch file that copies over the latest version of the scripts so everything is a one-click operation. Requires action on each system, but that's not the end of the world (since each one usually needs their configuration file changed slightly too).
Put everything in a Mercurial/Git reposotory and pull a fresh copy onto each node. Going straight to the repo from each machine would guarantee a current version (and would have the fringe benefit of allowing edits to the script to be made from any machine). Cons would be that it requires VCS to be installed on each machine and there might be some pains dealing with authentication since I wouldn't use a public repo.
Open up write access on a shared folder and write a script to use rsync (or similar) to push the changes out to all of the machines at once. This gets a current version on every machine (though you would have to change the script if you want to omit a machine or add a new one). Possible issue would be that each computer has to allow write access.
Dropbox is a reasonable suggestion (and could work well) but I dont want to use an external service and I'd prefer not to have to have dropbox running 24/7 on systems that would normally not need it.
Is there something simple that I am missing? Some tool designed expressly for doing this kind of thing?
Otherwise I am leaning toward just tying all of the systems into Mercurial since, while it requires extra software, it is a little more robust than writing a batch file (e.g. if I split part of a script into a separate module, Mercurial will know what to do whereas I would have to add a line to the batch file).
