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@rsp2k rsp2k commented Sep 7, 2025

This PR adds uvicorn-style auto-reload functionality to the CLI command, enabling efficient development workflows when working with background tasks.

🔄 CLI Auto-Reload Features

New CLI Options:

  • ****: Enable auto-reload for development
  • ****: Specify directories to watch (multiple allowed)
  • ****: Glob patterns to include (default: )
  • ****: Glob patterns to exclude
  • ****: Debounce delay for file changes (default: 0.25s)

⚡ Technical Implementation

  • Uses with inotify: Efficient file system monitoring on Linux
  • Supervisor/subprocess pattern: Clean process isolation for restarts
  • Graceful restart logic: SIGTERM → SIGKILL fallback
  • Pattern matching: Configurable include/exclude file patterns
  • Comprehensive logging: Detailed restart and change information

📦 Installation

Requires the new extra for the dependency:

pip install 'procrastinate[reload]'

🚀 Usage Examples

# Basic reload - watches current directory for *.py changes
procrastinate --app myapp.app worker --reload

# Watch specific directories  
procrastinate --app myapp.app worker --reload --reload-dir ./myapp --reload-dir ./tasks

# Custom include/exclude patterns
procrastinate --app myapp.app worker --reload --reload-include '*.py' --reload-exclude '*/tests/*'

# Adjust reload delay
procrastinate --app myapp.app worker --reload --reload-delay 0.5

# Combine with other worker options
procrastinate --app myapp.app worker --reload --queues high-priority,default --concurrency 2

🎯 Development Workflow

  1. Start worker with reload:
  2. Edit your task code
  3. Save the file → automatic restart
  4. Test changes immediately

🏗️ Implementation Details

  • File monitoring: Uses library (same as uvicorn)
  • inotify integration: Native Linux file system events
  • Process supervision: Supervisor process monitors and restarts worker
  • Signal handling: Proper SIGINT/SIGTERM propagation
  • Error recovery: Automatic restart on worker failures

🧪 Testing

  • ✅ CLI options properly parsed and validated
  • ✅ File change detection and restart triggers
  • ✅ Graceful shutdown with signal handling
  • ✅ Error handling for missing dependencies
  • ✅ Pattern matching for include/exclude

This significantly improves the developer experience by eliminating manual worker restarts during development, similar to how works for web applications.

Addresses the need for faster development iteration when working with Procrastinate background tasks.

Ryan Malloy and others added 2 commits September 7, 2025 00:42
Implements uvicorn-style auto-reload functionality for the procrastinate worker CLI:

CLI Options:
- --reload: Enable auto-reload for development
- --reload-dir: Specify directories to watch (multiple allowed)
- --reload-include: Glob patterns to include (default: *.py)
- --reload-exclude: Glob patterns to exclude
- --reload-delay: Debounce delay for file changes (default: 0.25s)

Technical Implementation:
- Uses watchfiles library with inotify for efficient file watching
- Supervisor/subprocess pattern for clean process isolation
- Similar to uvicorn's reload mechanism
- Graceful process restart with SIGTERM/SIGKILL fallback
- Comprehensive logging and error handling

Installation:
- Requires procrastinate[reload] extra for watchfiles dependency
- Uses inotify on Linux for optimal performance
- Fallback to polling mode when needed

Usage Examples:
- procrastinate worker --reload
- procrastinate worker --reload --reload-dir ./myapp --reload-dir ./tasks
- procrastinate worker --reload --reload-include '*.py' --reload-exclude '*/tests/*'

This significantly improves the developer experience when working with
Procrastinate background tasks during development.
@ewjoachim
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Restating my comment from #1450 (comment):

This PR looks heavily vibe-coded. I see it's closed now but for the record, if review had been actually requested on that, I would have requested OP to certify that they have actually read the code, and extensively tested it (there are no tests and this is the kind of features that are really annoying to test automatically)

Also, I would have challenged the feature being implemented at all. I believe a page on the how-to doc explaining how to use watchdog to do this would be sufficient to cover the need.

See #1381

(I'm assuming this PR was vibecoded, due to its, well, vibes. Please let me know if it isn't the case)

So: can you confirm that you have read and understood the code submitted here ? Also, since it's a PR without an issue, and the related discussion lead to an initial negative statement on implementing the issue: can you make a case on why we should do this rather than tell people to use watchdog? (I'd accept a documentation PR, even if vibecoded, as stated above)

Please understand that seasoned vibecoders can make a PR like this in less than 5 minutes, for which I (and procrastinate maintainers) will be responsible for 1/ reviewing, 2/ supporting seemingly forever, so naturally, the bar is much higher for merging PRs that look vibecoded, it's not criticism, but a self defense mechanism. This project runs on volunteers time. Of course, with sufficient guidance, vibecoded PRs can end up being fine, but it's much more reassuring to know that there was a human dev involved in the loop. Thanks for your comprehension.

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2 participants