config:generate_all:force will not actually generate files

[johngluckmdsol]

Repro steps In a project with the most recent version of the dice_bag gem installed, run `bundle exec rake config:generate_all:force

Expected: This should generate all files without prompting

Actual: No files are generated

[jfeltesse-mdsol]

Does it do anything when you run config:generate_all? Do you get an error message printed out or in a log file you could share?

Locally it works, could it be related to your environment/project? Is this a rails app btw?

[johngluckmdsol]

Okay, well I'm getting slightly different results now

in mauth

bundle exec rake config:generate_all
MonitorWares configuration file could not be found (expected it to be present at /Users/jgluck/repos/mauth/config/monitor_wares.yml).
Please run `bundle exec rake config`.
   identical  config/dalli.yml.dice
   identical  config/monitor_wares.yml.dice
   identical  config/newrelic.yml.dice
jgluck ~/repos/mauth (develop) $ ls config
amazon_s3.yml.dice  boot.rb     environment.rb  initializers  monitor_wares.yml.dice  privileged_uuids.yml.dice  secrets.yml.dice  tokens.yml.dice
application.rb      dalli.yml.dice  environments    locales   newrelic.yml.dice   routes.rb          shamus.yml.dice

I would have expected this to generate files. Yes, this is a rails app.

[jfeltesse-mdsol]

Just to be clear, "it should generates the files" you're talking about the *.dice templates, right? Because that's what the config:generate_all task is for, it picks up the templates that gems supporting this dice_bag feature advertise and creates the *.dice templates in the app's repository. The :force switch turns off the action prompt on conflict. See https://github.com/mdsol/dice_bag#generating-the-pre-packaged-templates.

If you're expecting this command to generate the configs file *from the `.dicetemplates** (e.g.my_file.yml.dice→my_file.yml), then that's theconfig` task you're looking for.

I cloned mauth and as far as I can tell it works as advertised. The current codebase contains old templates for dalli and MW, so upon the first generate_all run it prompts:

bx rake config:generate_all
    conflict  config/dalli.yml.dice
Overwrite /Users/jfeltesse/dev/repos/mauth/config/dalli.yml.dice? (enter "h" for help) [Ynaqdh]
(...)

If I restore the repo to its original state and run the command again with the :force switch, it doesn't prompt and generates the template files:

bx rake config:generate_all:force
       force  config/dalli.yml.dice
       force  config/monitor_wares.yml.dice
   identical  config/newrelic.yml.dice

[johngluckmdsol]

So this is a documentation problem. It is not clear what generate_all is supposed to be generating

[jfeltesse-mdsol]

How do you think we can improve the section of the README I linked to in my previous comment?

[johngluckmdsol]

Change config:generate_all will generate all the templates it can find. Since sometimes this behavior is not desirable you can use the config:generate_from_gems task to specify gem names: to config:generate_all will generate all the *.dice templates it can find from available gems. Note, it will not the yaml files, only the *.dice templates. Since sometimes this behavior is not desirable you can use the config:generate_from_gems task to specify gem names: And add the same description to the task description in the rake file or link to the documentation. This documentation is buried and I can assure you that developers don't use this because they don't understand the documentation or read it.

I would also change the structure and formatting of the documentation so that each task is it's own bold bullet point with descriptions, examples, recommendations

[jfeltesse-mdsol]

I agree the README is a bit messy and can lead to some confusion. It probably stems from the fact dice_bag has been developed in waves, by different people.

I think that if it's structured correctly we don't need to repeat all over the place that generate* commands are about generating the templates though.

And sorry if it was a bit unclear but when I write "we" I'm referring to the mdsol org, including you. As I wrote in my comment yesterday, no team owns dice_bag and PRs are welcomed.

[mjobin-mdsol]

I think this old discussion can be closed. No follow-up action items needed. If something has to be improved in the README, a PR shall be opened with actual changes.