Detect and restart hanging programs with Go
Do Not Pass Go!
If you want the process of restarting stalled programs to be particularly effective, supervised programs should be able to pick up where they left off instead of starting over. Rsync, for example, checks in --append mode whether a file of the same name from a previous, aborted transfer attempt already exists on the target machine and fast-forwards the transfer accordingly if it finds itself in such a situation.
In the call
$ rsync -avP --append file hoster.com
the -a (archive) option pushes a specified file to the server, while -v turns on verbose mode, and -P is short for --partial --progress. In this mode, rsync keeps partial files on the target server if the transfer was interrupted, and --progress shows the progress every second.
When called with
yoyo /usr/local/bin/rsync -avP ...
yoyo monitors the rsync process to see if it keeps on generating output. If nothing is happening, say, because the server is taking a power nap, yoyo aborts rsync and restarts it without further ado, resuming any unfinished business.
Note that yoyo expects the full path to the monitored program in the call and does not search the $PATH for it, unlike the shell. This is exactly what the doctor ordered, letting machines do what they do best and allowing humans to focus on creative work, thanks to automation.
Infos
- Expectre: https://github.com/mittwingate/expectre
The Author
Mike Schilli works as a software engineer in the San Francisco Bay Area, California. Each month in his column, which has been running since 1997, he researches practical applications of various programming languages. If you email him at mailto:mschilli@perlmeister.com he will gladly answer any questions.
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