Running the workflow

Duckflux workflows are plain YAML files — they don’t run on their own. You need a runtime to execute them.

Two official runtimes are available:

Runtime	Language	Best for
Go runner	Go	Production use, CLI tooling, CI/CD pipelines
JavaScript runtime	Node.js	Scripting, custom participants, JS ecosystems

Both runtimes share the same quack command and behave identically for standard workflows.

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Install a runtime

Go runner

See the Go runner installation guide for setup instructions.

JavaScript runtime

See the JavaScript runtime installation guide for setup instructions.

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Run a workflow

Once a runtime is installed, use quack to run any .flow.yaml file:

quack hello.flow.yaml

That’s the full command. The runtime reads the file, executes the flow, and prints the output.

Specifying a working directory

Use --cwd to set the base working directory for exec participants:

quack deploy.flow.yaml --cwd ./repo

This is equivalent to setting defaults.cwd in the workflow file itself, but applied from the command line. Useful when the workflow is shared but the working directory varies per environment.

Tip

The --cwd flag sets the base directory. Individual participants can still override it with their own cwd field. See Workflow files for the full precedence rules.