Comment by alex_suzuki
8 hours ago
100%. We used to design the pipeline a way that is easily reproducible locally, e.g. doesn’t rely on plugins of the CI runtime. Think build.sh shell script, normally invoked by CI runner but just as easy to run locally.
My automation is always an escalation of a run book that has gotten very precise and handles corner cases.
Even if I get the idea of an automation before there’s a run book for it.
I like run scripts. Shell or python scripts that do nothing other than prompt the user with what to do, or which choice to make, and wait for them to hit a key to proceed to the next step. Encode the run book flowchart into an interactive script. Then if a step can be automated, the run book script can directly call that automation. Eventually you may end up with a fully automated script, but even if you don't it can still be a significant help.