initial copy and modifications from the original py/impl/test/dist and

looponfail code. Now works as its own "xdist" plugin.

testing/conftest.py

@@ -0,0 +1,40 @@
+import py
+import execnet
+
+pytest_plugins = "pytester"
+option_report = 'skipped'
+    
+#rsyncdirs = ['.', '../xdist', py.path.local(execnet.__file__).dirpath()]
+
+def pytest_addoption(parser):
+    parser.addoption('--gx', 
+       action="append", dest="gspecs", default=None,
+       help=("add a global test environment, XSpec-syntax. "))
+
+def pytest_funcarg__specssh(request):
+    return getspecssh(request.config)
+def getgspecs(config):
+    return [execnet.XSpec(spec)
+                for spec in config.getvalueorskip("gspecs")]
+
+# configuration information for tests 
+def getgspecs(config):
+    return [execnet.XSpec(spec) 
+                for spec in config.getvalueorskip("gspecs")]
+
+def getspecssh(config):
+    xspecs = getgspecs(config)
+    for spec in xspecs:
+        if spec.ssh:
+            if not py.path.local.sysfind("ssh"):
+                py.test.skip("command not found: ssh")
+            return spec
+    py.test.skip("need '--gx ssh=...'")
+
+def getsocketspec(config):
+    xspecs = getgspecs(config)
+    for spec in xspecs:
+        if spec.socket:
+            return spec
+    py.test.skip("need '--gx socket=...'")
+