DSH(1)                  NetBSD General Commands Manual                  DSH(1)

NAME
     dsh -- run a command on a cluster of machines

SYNOPSIS
     dsh [-eiqtv] [-f fanout] [-g rungroup1,...,rungroupN] [-l username]
         [-o porttimeout] [-p portnum] [-w node1,...,nodeN]
         [-x node1,...,nodeN] [command ...]
     dsh [-eiqtv] [-f fanout] [-g rungroup1,...,rungroupN] [-l username]
         [-o porttimeout] [-p portnum] [-w node1,...,nodeN]
         [-x node1,...,nodeN] -s scriptname [arguments ...]

DESCRIPTION
     The dsh utility can be used to run a command, or group of commands on a
     cluster of machines.  All commands are run in parallel, on the cluster.
     Interrupt signals will be sent to the remote host that is currently being
     displayed to the user.  The following options are available:

     -e   Unless the -e option is specified, stderr from remote commands will
          not be reported to the user.

     -f   If the -f option is specified, followed by a number, it sets the
          fanout size of the cluster.  The fanout size is the number of nodes
          a command will run on in parallel at one time.  Thus a 80 node clus-
          ter, with a fanout size of 64, would run 64 nodes in parallel, then,
          when all have finished, it would execute the command on the last 16
          nodes.  The fanout size defaults to 64.  This option overrides the
          FANOUT environment variable.

     -g   If the -g option is specified, followed by a comma separated list of
          group names, the command will only be run on that group of nodes.  A
          node may be a part of more than one group if desired, however run-
          ning without the -g option will run the command on the same node as
          many times as it appears in the file specified by the CLUSTER envi-
          ronment variable.  This option is silently ignored if used with the
          -w option.

     -i   The -i option will list information about the current cluster, and
          command groupings.  It will print out the current value of the
          fanout, and how many groups of machines there are within the clus-
          ter. It will also show you which command you are about to run, and
          your username if specified with the -l option.

     -l   If the -l option is specified, followed by a username, the commands
          will be run under that userid on the remote machines.  Consideration
          must be taken for proper authentication, for this to work.

     -o   The -o option is used to set the timeout in seconds to be used when
          testing remote connections.  The default is five seconds.

     -p   The -p option can be used to set the port number that testing should
          occur on when testing remote connections.  The default behavior is
          to guess based on the remote command name.

     -q   The -q option does not issue any commands, but displays information
          about the cluster, and the fanout groupings.

     -s   The -s option causes dsh to copy a script to the remote machine,
          execute it once, and delete it, all in a single operation.  The -s
          option requires a script name, which will be copied to all remote
          machines and executed.  You may also optionally specify any number
          of additional arguments to the script on the command line.  The
          script will be placed in a temporary directory under /tmp on the
          remote node, executed, and then the directory will be recursively
          deleted.  Any executable can be used as the script, regardless of
          programming language.  The script is copied with the tar command,
          preserving permissions of the original.  The -s option cannot be
          used with the standard mode of dsh to run other commands, nor can it
          be used in interactive mode.

     -t   The -t option causes dsh to attempt a connection test to each node
          prior to attempting to run the remote command.  If the test fails
          for any reason, the remote command will not be attempted.  This can
          be useful when clusterfiles have suffered bitrot and some nodes no
          longer exist, or might be down for maintenance.  The default timeout
          is 5 seconds.  The timeout can be changed with the -o option.  dsh
          will attempt to guess the port number of the remote service based on
          your RCMD_CMD setting.  It knows about ssh and rsh.  If dsh fails to
          guess your port correctly, you may use the -p argument to set the
          remote port number.  If the RCMD_TEST environment variable exists,
          the testing will automatically take place.

     -v   Prints the version of ClusterIt to the stdout, and exits.

     -w   If the -w option is specified, followed by a comma delimited list of
          machine names, the command will be run on each node in the list.
          Without this option, dsh runs on the nodes listed in the file
          pointed to by the CLUSTER environment variable.

     -x   The -x option can be used to exclude specific nodes from the clus-
          ter.  The format is the same as the -w option, a comma delimited
          list of machine names.  This option is silently ignored if used with
          the -w option.

ENVIRONMENT
     dsh utilizes the following environment variables.

     CLUSTER            Contains a filename, which is a newline separated list
                        of nodes in the cluster.

     RCMD_CMD           Command to use to connect to remote machines.  The
                        command chosen must be able to connect with no pass-
                        word to the remote host.  Defaults to rsh

     RCMD_CMD_ARGS      Arguments to pass to the remote shell command.
                        Defaults to none.

     RCMD_PORT          The port number used to test remote connections.  See
                        the -p flag.

     RCMD_TEST          When set, dsh will automatically test all hosts before
                        launching the remote command. See the -t option for
                        more information.

     RCMD_TEST_TIMEOUT  The timeout in seconds to use when testing for remote
                        connections.

     RCMD_USER          The username to connect to remote machines as by
                        default.

     FANOUT             When set, limits the maximum number of concurrent com-
                        mands sent at once.  This can be used to keep from
                        overloading a small host when sending out commands in
                        parallel.  Defaults to 64.  This environment setting
                        can be overridden by the -f option.

FILES
     The file pointed to by the CLUSTER environment variable has the following
     format:

           pollux
           castor
           GROUP:alpha
           rigel
           kent
           GROUP:sparc
           alshain
           altair
           LUMP:alphasparc
           alpha
           sparc

     This example would have pollux and castor a member of no groups, rigel
     and kent a member of group 'alpha', and alshain and altair a member of
     group `sparc'.  Note the format of the GROUP command, it is in all capi-
     tal letters, followed by a colon, and the group name.  There can be no
     spaces following the GROUP command, or in the name of the group.

     There is also a LUMP command, which is identical in syntax to the GROUP
     command.  This command allows you to create a named group of groups.
     Each member of the lump is the name of a group.  The LUMP command is ter-
     minated by another LUMP or GROUP command, or the EOF marker.

     Any line beginning with a `#' symbol denotes a comment field, and the
     entire line will be ignored.  Note that a hash mark placed anywhere other
     than the first character of a line, will be considered part of a valid
     hostname or command.

EXAMPLES
     The command:

           dsh hostname

     will display:

           pollux: pollux
           castor: castor

     if the file pointed to by CLUSTER contains:

           pollux
           castor

     The command:

           dsh -w hadar,rigel hostname

     will display:

           hadar:  hadar
           rigel:  rigel

     The command:

           dsh -w hadar,rigel -s /bin/date

     Will copy /bin/date to /tmp/dsh.$$ on hadar and rigel and execute it on
     each node, displaying the date and time on each remote machine, assuming
     that the /bin/date you copied is a valid binary for the remote end.

DIAGNOSTICS
     Exit status is 0 on success, 1 if an error occurs.

SEE ALSO
     dshbak(1), pcp(1), pdf(1), prm(1), rsh(1), tar(1), kerberos(3),
     hosts.equiv(5), rhosts(5)

HISTORY
     The dsh command appeared in clusterit 1.0. It is based on the dsh command
     in IBM PSSP.

AUTHOR
     Dsh was written by Tim Rightnour.

BUGS
     Solaris 2.5.1 has a maximum of 256 open file descriptors.  This means
     that dsh will fail on a fanout size greater than about 32-40 nodes.

NetBSD 4.0_BETA2                January 9, 2007               NetBSD 4.0_BETA2
