party - Run a Party of Commands

party is a minimal command runner that aims to automate running a repetitive sequence of commands (usually during development).

It is designed to run a set of default or user-defined commands either sequentially or in parallel.

Installation

cargo install --locked party

How To Run

Party with default commands

party run

By default party run will run sequentially the commands:

1. cargo fmt
2. cargo clippy -- -Dwarnings
3. cargo test

Run a custom party

party looks in the project for a party.toml file (or a specific file if run with -f). For simplicity, the command below will create a party.toml file with the default commands in the current directory:

party init

This generates a local party.toml:

[[tasks]]
command = "cargo fmt"

[[tasks]]
command = "cargo clippy -- -Dwarnings"

[[tasks]]
command = "cargo test"

[!IMPORTANT]
If using party <= 0.1.4 the syntax for the command is:

command = ["command", "arg1", "arg2", "arg3"]

This is incompatible with party 0.2.0 and above and all party.toml files must be updated.

Once the file is ready, invoking party run will run your custom party of commands! To run a single party command, use party run -i [COMMAND_NUMBER].

Validate the command party is good

To validate the configuration file is correct or to just check what commands would be run, a summary can be generated by running:

party info

Run a parallel party

Sometimes commands are independent and can be run in parallel to save a bit of time. party allows this via the parallel flag in the configuration flag.

In the example below, the second and third command are independent and have the parallel flag set to true. If the flag is missing, it is considered to be false.

[[tasks]]
command = "cargo fmt"

[[tasks]]
command = "cargo clippy -- -Dwarnings"
parallel = true

[[tasks]]
command = "cargo test"
parallel = true

[[tasks]]
command = "cat results.txt"

The commands that are paralelised in the configuration have a [P] tag in party info:

[ ][1/4]: cargo fmt
[P][2/4]: cargo clippy -- -Dwarnings
[P][3/4]: cargo test
[ ][4/4]: cat results.txt

For simplicity, party batches commands in subparties in the following way:

• A command that has the parallel flag set to false is run in its own batch
• All consecutive commands with the flag set to true are batched together
• The next command with the flag set to false is run in its own batch

Use party batch to verify this:

4 tasks will be run in 3 batches. All tasks in a batch are run in parallel.
Batch [1/3] with 1 commands:
  - cargo fmt
Batch [2/3] with 2 commands:
  - cargo clippy -- -Dwarnings
  - cargo test
Batch [3/3] with 1 commands:
  - cat results.txt

For more information, run party help, or party [COMMAND] --help.

Environment Variables

This feature is available in party 0.3.0 and above.

Commands ran by party implicitly keep the environment in which they are ran. You can also specify additional environment variables for each command:

[[tasks]]
command = "cargo fmt"

[[tasks]]
env = { RUST_BACKTRACE = "1" }
command = "cargo test"
parallel = true

[[tasks]]
env = { LOG = "debug", VALUE = "test" }
command = "cat results.txt"

In the example configuration above, the first command runs without any additional environment variables. The second command runs with RUST_BACKTRACE = 1 and the third with LOG = debug and VALUE = test.

The value of each environment variable must be specified as a string.