Capistrano with sudo

Capistrano with sudo

An easy way to execute commands with sudo from within a capistrano job is to add the prefix  #{sudo} to a command within your capistrano task.  For example:

task :make_protected_dir, :roles =>db do
  run "#{sudo} mkdir /root/mydir"
end

Another example:

task :restart_httpd, :roles =>app do
  run "#{sudo} /etc/init.d/httpd restart"
end

Then from the command line, load your file with these entries:

cap -f capfile

Then, execute the commands:

cap make_protected_dir

cap restart_httpd

More info:

https://github.com/capistrano/capistrano/wiki/2.x-DSL-Configuration-Tasks-Task

Install capistrano on RHEL or CentOS

Capistrano is great for automating system tasks. Here is how to install it on RPM-based systems:

# yum install ruby rubygems
# gem install mocha echoe rake capistrano

Please note that mocha, echoe are optional for tests, but I included them in these instructions.