[feature request] job development workflow support

[jeteve]

Hi, I'm contemplating using nomad-pack to well.. package all the jobs of my application in one neat package.

Here's my dream workflow:

A. Include new job:

• Write/Develop a vanilla nomad job, with variables and good old ${var.myvar} or var.myvar variable references. Note that my favourite source of variable is currently environment variables ( i.e. NOMAD_VAR_myvar)
• Include the job without any modification into my existing pack.
• Repeat for other jobs.

B. Modify a job:

• Extract the job definition from the pack
• Modify independently
• Re-pack the job.

I'd like to work this way to avoid having to redeploy the whole pack to my dev environment each time I want to work on a given job.

As far as I understand, the way nomad-pack manages variables makes the workflow A impossible. I would have to change my job so the variable it uses (and the template syntax to access them) is now nomad-pack specific.

I suppose workflow B could be supported by the render command, but then I would lose the variable definitions.

I guess supporting workflow A would require nomad-pack to:

• Allow variables to be the superset of all variables mentioned in individual jobs.
• Allow individual jobs to keep using the ${var.} or var. syntax
• Allow variables to come from environment variables. (Not a strong requirement).

Does all of this make sense or am I missing something fundamental?