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BUILDIT(8)             DragonFly System Manager's Manual            BUILDIT(8)


NAME

     buildit - time a command, log its output and mail notification when
     finished


SYNOPSIS

     buildit [-m] -l logfile command ...


DESCRIPTION

     The buildit command is a trivial wrapper script for running commands
     unattended.  buildit will start the given command using time(1); log the
     stdout and stderr of the command in the given logfile; wait for
     termination of the command while printing its output on the terminal; and
     then optionally mail the head and tail of the logfile to the calling
     user.

     The date(1) command is called before and after the command so that there
     is a start and end date of the process in the logfile.


OPTIONS

     The options are as follows:

     -m                 do not send mail when finished.

     -l logfile         log stdin and stderr to this logfile.  If the logfile
                        already exists, it is moved to logfile.old.


EXAMPLES

     Here are typical usages of the buildit command:

           buildit -l /var/src/install.out make installworld | whereintheworld

           buildit -l trace.log povray +iscene +oscene.out


DIAGNOSTICS

     Exit status is 0 on success, and 1 if the command fails for one of the
     following reasons:

     -l parameter mandatory  No logfile has been chosen.


COMPATIBILITY

     The mail(1) command is called to send email, with the -s flag to set the
     subject. This might not work equally on all systems.


SEE ALSO

     time(1), wait(1), head(1), tail(1), mail(1), date(1), kill(1),
     whereintheworld(8).


HISTORY

     The buildit manual page was first written for worldtools 1.2


AUTHORS

     The buildit command and this manual page were written by The Anarcat
     <anarcat@anarcat.ath.cx>.


BUGS

     buildit might leave stray processes running, even after being
     interrupted. This is due to a bug in sh since calling trap from a
     subshell has no effect. See the file test_trap.sh in the source
     distribution for an example.

DragonFly 6.5-DEVELOPMENT      December 9, 2003      DragonFly 6.5-DEVELOPMENT

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