NAME

     spawn - is a job spawner.

SYNOPSIS

     spawn [ -cmd commands ] [ -totalnodes totalnodes ] [ -nodel-
     ist nodelist ] [ -N ] [ -V ] [ -h ]

DESCRIPTION

     spawn takes commands and  spawns  them  into  seperate  jobs
     (either  on  different  machines  through rsh or on the same
     machine through forks). Spawn can be used on a CPU intensive
     job to split it across several machines.

OPTIONS

     spawn accepts the following command line options:

     -cmd commands
          Specifies the commands to be executed.

     -totalnodes totalnodes
          Indicates how many nodes you want to use.

     -nodelist nodelist
          Indicates which nodes you want to  use.   The  argument
          nodelist  has  the  format node1:node2:node3:...:nodeN.
          When -nodes is not  specified,  jobs  will  be  spawned
          locally.

     -V   Verbose mode.

     -N   No halt on error conditions.

     -h   Help.

EXAMPLES

     The following spawn executes a "pwd" twice  on  3  different
     machines.

          spawn -cmd "pwd; pwd" -nodes gpsa:gpsb:gpsc

     The following command executes two pwd commands 5  times  on
     the local machine.

          spawn -cmd "pwd; pwd" -totalnodes 5

     Note that to get return codes from the  last  command  in  a
     list of commands (such as "pwd; pwd", for example), you must
     connect the commands with &&.  The  following  command  exe-
     cutes  cmd1.   If unsuccessful, the return code is returned.
     Otherwise, cmd2 is executed.  If  unsuccessful,  the  return
     code is returned.  Otherwise, ... etc.

          spawn -cmd "cmd1 && cmd2 && cmd3 && cmd4"

     The total number of nodes and the node number can be pass to
     the command through the following variables.

          spawn -cmd "echo {totalnodes} {nodenumber}" -totalnodes
     2

FILES

     ~/.rhosts list of valid remote hostnames.

AUTHOR

     Douglas Horn, Affordable Systems, Inc. (1994) Kelly D. Craw-
     ford, APR (1993).

COPYRIGHT

     copyright 2001, Amoco Production Company
               All Rights Reserved
          an affiliate of BP America Inc.