The main goal of this feature request is to make commands like the following possible

assert_script_run('wget ... &');     # Or whatever other command you want
assert_script_run('wget ... &');     # Or whatever other command you want
assert_script_run('wait');

Btw. in the case anyone wonders "why on Earth would anyone ever want to do that": We use this to install and update our virtualization guests in parallel:

# Install guests
assert_script_run("virt-install ... & true ") foreach (keys %virt_autotest::common::guests);
assert_script_run("wait", timeout => 3000);
# [...]

# Update guests
foreach my $guest (keys %virt_autotest::common::guests) 
    # [...]
    assert_script_run("ssh root\@$guest 'zypper ref && zypper -n dup' </dev/null >$guest.txt 2>&1 & true");
}
assert_script_run("wait", timeout => 1200);

It should be possible to use

assert_script_run('(wget ... &)');

right?

okurz wrote:

It should be possible to use

assert_script_run('(wget ... &)');

right?

That will work, but you will not be able to wait for those jobs. This means, while this the job is scheduled in the background, a 'wait' will fail:

assert_script_run('(wget ... &)'); # will work
assert_script_run('(wget ... &)'); # will work
assert_script_run('(wget ... &)'); # will work
assert_script_run('wait');         # will NOT wait for the previous wget

Perhaps the following snippet is more useful to illustrate the problem:

( sleep 30 & ); jobs                    # will not list anything
( sleep 30 & ); wait                    # will not wait for sleep
sleep 30 & jobs                         # works
sleep 30 & wait                         # lists sleep

Another idea (instead of looking for & or ; in the command) could be to add a parameter to assert_script_run, e.g. background => 1.

Well, I am open for the proposal, I just wonder if that is really making things more clear to users.

Two other things that I think will work, please confirm if it does do what you want or not:

1. Use type_string instead of script_run
2. Instead of sleep 1&, call sleep 1&:

okurz wrote:

Well, I am open for the proposal, I just wonder if that is really making things more clear to users.

Two other things that I think will work, please confirm if it does do what you want or not:

1. Use type_string instead of script_run
2. Instead of sleep 1&, call sleep 1&:

Both should work, and I am sure that all openQA devs have figured a way to deal with background jobs already.

The feature request aims at a different purpose: To make the behaviour of assert_script_run and script_run be closer to the behaviour of bash, or more specifically, to be able to terminate a command with & without getting a syntax error. I think that could lower the bar a bit for fresh users/devs, because this is an issue, where everyone stumbles across at some point.

ph03nix wrote:

Update guests¶

foreach my $guest (keys %virt_autotest::common::guests)
# [...]
assert_script_run("ssh root\@$guest 'zypper ref && zypper -n dup' $guest.txt 2>&1 & true");
}
assert_script_run("wait", timeout => 1200);

I feel like what you may actually want here is for assert_script_run to return an ID that you can wait on.

okurz wrote:

Absolutely. I prepared a quick PR myself now: https://github.com/os-autoinst/os-autoinst/pull/1619

The PR modifies the internal handling of ; in ... so that this specific case can work:

assert_script_run 'sleep 30 &'

Discussion in the comments led to a counter-proposal for a new function enter_string, and updating of existing uses to prevent people from habitually trying to stick to assert_script_run even when it's not the best option.

Yeah I am still torn. To me enter_string sounds highly ambiguous and easy to confuse with type_string.

PR merged. Now we (or I) can try to come up with a corresponding change for os-autoinst-distri-opensuse itself to show how the new function can be used:

https://github.com/os-autoinst/os-autoinst-distri-opensuse/pull/12086

The PR introducing enter_cmd was merged. os-autoinst#os-autoinst#1632 proposes background_script_run which takes a command and returns the PID as well

https://github.com/os-autoinst/os-autoinst-distri-opensuse/pull/12998