Vincent Warmerdam • 4/21/2026

til flock

This article discusses a common issue in homelab auto-deployments where cron jobs trigger overlapping builds. The author explains how to use the `flock` command with a lock file and the `-n` (non-blocking) flag to prevent multiple instances of a deploy script from running simultaneously. It also recommends adding a timeout to handle hanging scripts. The pattern is useful for those who prefer pull-based deployments from GitHub over webhooks.

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#deployment #bash #Cron