distman

distman is a configuration-driven file distribution manager for safe, versioned software rollouts to predefined filesystem locations.

It is designed for production pipelines where deterministic deployments, environment-aware paths, quick version switching, and rollback matter more than building and installing packages.

deploy/
├── bin/
│   ├── tool -> versions/tool.2.a1b2c3d
│   └── versions/
│       ├── tool.1.91c8a77
│       └── tool.2.a1b2c3d
└── .distman/
    └── epoch

Why distman

Deploy safely

• Copy files and directories into immutable numbered versions
• Switch the active deployment with a symlink
• Preview changes before touching the destination
• Refuse uncommitted source changes unless explicitly forced

Configure once

• Describe deployments in a repository-level dist.json
• Resolve destination paths from environment variables
• Select targets by name or wildcard
• Expand source globs into matching destinations

Prepare and cache

• Run Python functions or shell commands before distribution
• Replace tokens, change modes, byte-compile Python, and minify assets
• Mirror active deployments to a fast local cache
• Avoid unnecessary remote checks with epoch files and a configurable TTL

Install

pip install -U distman

Quickstart

Create dist.json at the root of a Git repository:

{
  "author": "pipeline@example.com",
  "targets": {
    "tools": {
      "source": "tools",
      "destination": "{DEPLOY_ROOT}/tools"
    }
  }
}

Preview and then deploy:

dist --dryrun
dist --yes

The same operation is available through the suite command:

distman dist --dryrun

Learn More

• Getting Started: first deployment and version layout
• Distribution Configuration: dist.json, paths, and targets
• CLI Reference: distribution and cache commands
• Transform Pipelines: preprocessing files before deployment
• Local Caching: keeping a local mirror of active versions