Cleaner orthogonal API

[manxorist]

The cpa.sh is IMHO a step in the right direction, however it seems this can be cleaned up a little bit more.

Currently, there is no way to delay the startup of the VM or to explicitly shutdown the VM (except for from inside the VM).

It is also somewhat unclear whether the global sync_files defaults or overrides or applies to cpa.sh --sync-files.

I want to suggest making every single step explicit, and nothing implicit (except for shutting down the VM if it is still running at the end of the workflow).

This would imply removing/deprecating the sync_files setting, and providing the following operations via cpa.sh:

• --startup
• --sync-files runner-to-vm and --sync-files vm-to-runner. both and none are rather meaningless when everything is explicit.
• --reboot
• --shutdown

Long-term, it might also be useful to support delaying downloading of the VM image and cleaning up the VM image after the VM is shutdown, for use cases where a lot of additional disk space might be required before or after running inside the VM.

It would be somewhat consistent to also make running commands in the VM explicit via cpa.sh --run.

[Xottab-DUTY]

It is also somewhat unclear whether the global sync_files defaults or overrides or applies to cpa.sh --sync-files.

It's for the exact step that boots the VM only.

As for the rest, you are suggesting an overcomplicated API.
It's not a low-level backend API where orthogonal design would fit.
Few users would vote positively for --reboot and --shutdown, but many people using this action just run it in a single step (or a few small steps) and they are happy with the fact that everything just works and things are done automatically. (check usage examples)

IMHO.

[jacob-carlborg]

Currently, there is no way to delay the startup of the VM

What do you mean "delay"? The VM won't start unless you explicitly invoke the action.

explicitly shutdown the VM

There are no plans to support shutting down the VM with the new syntax. It adds more complexity and takes longer for the job to finish.