Show HN: Mustardwatch: Detect what files a program uses, rerun when they change
a year ago
- #linux
- #command-line-tool
- #file-monitoring
- mustardwatch is a tool that runs a command, traces it to detect files it uses or might use, and watches those files for changes to rerun the command upon changes.
- It is implemented using the Linux ptrace API (similar to strace) and currently only supports x86-64 Linux.
- Usage: `mustardwatch [OPTION...] COMMAND [ARG...]`
- Key features include tracking files used by subprocesses (though subprocesses are killed when the main process exits) and skipping files in common global directories by default.
- Options include clearing the screen before running the program (`-c`), watching directories (`-d`), not skipping global files (`-g`), outputting watched files to a file (`-o`), and verbose output (`-v`).
- For more details, refer to the comments in `mustardwatch.c`.