Task Execution

Sake offers multiple execution strategies that controls how tasks are executed across the hosts. The available ones are:

• linear: execute task for each host before proceeding to the next task (default)
• host_pinned: executes tasks (serial) for a host before proceeding to the next host
• free: executes tasks without waiting for other tasks

You can set the strategy via the stragegy property in a spec definition or via a flag --strategy [option].

Additionally, the following properties are available to further control task execution:

• batch: number of hosts to run in parallel
• batch_p: percentage of hosts to run in parallel
• forks: max number of concurrent processes

Linear Strategy

When the following properties are set:

• strategy: linear
• batch: 2
• forks: 10000

Sake will execute according to the following image:

1. Task T1 will run in parallel for hosts H1 and H2
2. Task T1 will run for host H3
3. Task T2 will run in parallel for hosts H1 and H2
4. Task T2 will run for host H3
5. Task T3 will run in parallel for hosts H1 and H2
6. Task T3 will run for host H3

Host Pinned Strategy

When the following properties are set:

• strategy: host_pinned
• batch: 2
• forks: 10000

Sake will execute according to the following image:

1. Tasks T1 - T3 will run serially for H1 and H2 (in parallel)
2. Tasks T1 - T3 will run serially for H3

Free Strategy

When the following properties are set:

• strategy: free
• batch_p: 100%
• forks: 10000

Sake will execute according to the following image:

1. All tasks for all hosts will run in parallel

Ordering Hosts

There are multiple host ordering options available:

• inventory: the order is as provided by the inventory
• reverse_inventory: the order is the reverse of the inventory
• sorted: hosts are alphabetically sorted by host
• reverse_sorted: hosts are sorted by host in reverse alphabetical order
• random: hosts are randomly ordered

Confirm Before Running Tasks

sake comes with two options to confirm tasks before execution:

• confirm: this property is used when you want to simply confirm the task you invoked before running
  • it can be specified either via flag --confirm or the spec property confirm
• step: this property is used when you want to confirm each task individually
  • it can be specified either via flag --step or the spec property step
    • Invoking --step will provide the user 3 options:
      • yes: run the task
      • no: skip the task
      • continue: run the task and don't prompt for the next tasks