Download pdsh source code or src.rpm from http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdsh .

[root@headnode data]# rpmbuild --rebuild pdsh-2.17-1.src.rpm  
  
[root@headnode data]# rpm -ivh /usr/src/redhat/RPMS/x86_64/pdsh-*  
Preparing...                ########################################### [100%]  
1:pdsh-rcmd-ssh          ########################################### [ 14%]  
2:pdsh                   ########################################### [ 29%]  
3:pdsh-debuginfo         ########################################### [ 43%]  
4:pdsh-mod-dshgroup      ########################################### [ 57%]  
5:pdsh-mod-machines      ########################################### [ 71%]  
6:pdsh-mod-netgroup      ########################################### [ 86%]  
7:pdsh-rcmd-exec         ########################################### [100%]  
[root@headnode data]#

Now you can try executing commands on the cluster nodes, all at the same time. For example, let’s run “uptime” on all nodes:

[root@headnode data]# pdsh -w headnode,sm,node1,node2 uptime  
failed to install module options for "misc/dshgroup"  
headnode: Warning: Permanently added the RSA host key for IP address '192.168.20.100' to the list of known hosts.  
sm:  16:03:00 up  7:14,  1 user,  load average: 0.00, 0.00, 0.00  
headnode:  16:53:16 up  7:23,  1 user,  load average: 0.00, 0.04, 0.01  
node2:  15:55:21 up  2:31,  1 user,  load average: 0.04, 0.01, 0.00  
node1:  15:56:07 up  2:31,  1 user,  load average: 0.00, 0.00, 0.00  
[root@headnode data]#

You can have a list of all your machines listed in a file (/etc/machines) by default.

[root@headnode ~]# vi /etc/machines  
headnode  
sm  
node1  
node2

Note: -a will read hostnames from the default machine file (/etc/machines). As shown below:-

[root@headnode ~]# pdsh -a  uptime  
failed to install module options for "misc/dshgroup"  
sm:  14:09:58 up  5:10,  1 user,  load average: 0.01, 0.00, 0.00  
headnode:  15:00:11 up  5:11,  1 user,  load average: 0.08, 0.02, 0.01  
node2:  14:02:17 up  5:10,  1 user,  load average: 0.00, 0.00, 0.00  
node1:  14:03:05 up  5:10,  1 user,  load average: 0.00, 0.00, 0.00  
[root@headnode ~]#

The other utility included in pdsh RPM is pdcp. Which will copy a file to multiple machines. Hoever, for pdcp to work, all nodes (involved in pdcp operation), must have a local copy of pdcp installed for a successful operation.

So for convenience, we will copy the pdsh-* RPMs to all the compute nodes as well.

[root@headnode modules-3.2.6]# scp /usr/src/redhat/RPMS/i386/pdsh-* node1:/root/

pdsh-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 252KB 251.5KB/s 00:00

pdsh-mod-dshgroup-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 10KB 10.2KB/s 00:00

pdsh-mod-machines-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 8293 8.1KB/s 00:00

pdsh-mod-netgroup-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 10KB 9.9KB/s 00:00

pdsh-rcmd-exec-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 9888 9.7KB/s 00:00

pdsh-rcmd-ssh-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 11KB 10.7KB/s 00:00

[root@headnode modules-3.2.6]# scp /usr/src/redhat/RPMS/i386/pdsh-* node2:/root/

pdsh-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 252KB 251.5KB/s 00:00

pdsh-mod-dshgroup-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 10KB 10.2KB/s 00:00

pdsh-mod-machines-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 8293 8.1KB/s 00:00

pdsh-mod-netgroup-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 10KB 9.9KB/s 00:00

pdsh-rcmd-exec-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 9888 9.7KB/s 00:00

pdsh-rcmd-ssh-2.17-1.i386.rpm 100% 11KB 10.7KB/s 00:00

You can use a for loop to copy these files from master node to all compute nodes.

Install these RPMs on all nodes:-

[root@headnode ~]# pdsh -a "rpm -ivh /root/pdsh-*.rpm"

Now I can copy a file to all nodes, such as:

[root@headnode modules-3.2.6]# pdcp -a /etc/hosts /etc

The options of pdcp are almost the same as pdsh.

That is all! Happy super computing!