xal

Xal is a contextual execution framework for Python. “xal” is the acronym of “eXecution Abstraction Layer”.

Warning

This project is experimental. Current goal is to implement a proof-of-concept that can be shown to, discussed with or tried by users of tools like subprocess, Fabric, zc.buildout, Salt...

Xal helps you create scripts to perform actions on a system, like managing non-Python resources, independantly from the execution context.

The main motivation of this library is about sharing system scripts:

  • scripts are written with session as argument, they use an high-level abstract API;
  • sessions are registries, they encapsulate API implementation: local Python shell, Fabric, Salt...

Example

Let’s create a xal-compatible function. It takes the execution context as input argument:

>>> def home_directory_exists(session):
...     """Return True if home directory of session's user exists."""
...     return session.dir.exists(session.dir.home)

Then create an execution session. The LocalSession used here is a pre-configured registry:

>>> from xal.session.local import LocalSession
>>> session = LocalSession()

Finally run the function in the session:

>>> home_directory_exists(session)
True