Tasks as Strings

Usage

The simplest way to define a task for jogger to execute is simply a string containing the command to execute on the command line. In jog.py, that might look like:

tasks = {
    'hello': 'echo "Hello, World!"',
    'test': 'coverage run python manage.py test'
}

The advantage of adding tasks like this is to provide shortcuts to common commands, perhaps ones that take a series of arguments and thus lend themselves to using a shortcut.

However, there are disadvantages as well. Tasks defined as strings are executed as-is, they cannot be customised by passing arguments when running the task. For example, considering the test task defined above:

jog test  # good
jog test myproject.tests.test_module  # bad

Default arguments

String-based tasks accept a minimal set of default arguments:

-h/--help: Display the task’s help output. For string-based tasks, this is very minimal, and cannot be customised. It simply states what the task does (i.e. it outputs the command string itself).
--stderr: The output stream to use for error messages. Defaults to the system’s stderr stream. Can be redirected, e.g. to a file: jog test --stderr /home/myuser/logs/test/err.log.
--stdout: The output stream to use for general messages. Defaults to the system’s stdout stream. Can be redirected, e.g. to a file: jog test --stdout /home/myuser/logs/test/out.log.