[nycbug-talk] New Setup Questions

[Matt Juszczak]

Setting this up on two test servers and seeing how it does :) I had just 
read before that it had serious limitations working with multiple 
operating systems.

On Sat, 18 Apr 2009, Brian Gupta wrote:

> Matt,
> 
> I'm gonna talk about puppet since that's what I know. With puppet, since you are running a centralized configuration
> management system, you can keep your config files in puppet.
> 
> Puppet understands a number of resources types. These include:
> - Files
> - Users
> - Packages
> - Services
> - Cron
> - sshkeys
> 
> and many more.. See here for a relatively full list: http://reductivelabs.com/trac/puppet/wiki/TypeReference
> 
> In addition.. Puppet can exec arbitrary code in the event that what you need to do is not yet supported.
> 
> Puppet let's you structure nodes and classes in an object hierarchy. Very cool when work with related machine types.
> 
> I'm curious how you found puppet limited? (Particularly as compared to your SVN proposal).
> 
> Thanks,
> Brian
> 
> On Fri, Apr 17, 2009 at 11:01 PM, Matt Juszczak <matt at atopia.net> wrote:
>       That's what I'm trying to figure out.  These two questions sort of intertwine themselves.  If we decide to go
>       the "ports scripted" route, we'll most likely have scripts like this in SVN:
>
>       ./webserver-setup.sh -h<option1> -i<option2>
>
>       which will basically do a cvsup /etc/ports-supfile, install necessary ports (all the same version of course),
>       install php, etc.  Then, we'd push the configuration files via svn as well.
>
>       If we decide to go a package route, we might even put the packages in SVN, so that you can "check out" the
>       repository of packages.
>
>       I've looked at puppet, and I've looked at CF engine: puppet seems limited, and CF Engine seems complex.
>        Seems like it's a pick your poison.
> 
> 
> On Fri, 17 Apr 2009, Brian Gupta wrote:
>
>       Not to start up the cfengine vs puppet debate again, but one question. How do you plan to handle
>       package installation?
>       That's one thing where CMS can really help.
>
>       -Brian
>
>       On Fri, Apr 17, 2009 at 1:42 PM, Matt Juszczak <matt at atopia.net> wrote:
>            We're launching an entirely new setup across FreeBSD boxes - about 50
>            servers total.  I have two things which I'm still somewhat debating, and
>            thought I'd get a second opinion.
>
>            First, instead of using CFEngine to manage the boxes, I was thinking of
>            using an SVN-based setup.  Each server would checkout their appropriate
>            files via SVN, and I would "trigger" each server when it needs an update
>            via config files that would be fetched often via either ftp or svn.  This
>            is neat and flexible, but not as complex as CFEngine.  Thoughts?
>
>            Second, I'm trying to decide how to do packages.  Across the 50 servers
>            we'll have about 6 or 7 different hardware sets.  Some will be Dell, some
>            IBM, etc.  Most will be 64 bit boxes (to address larger memory ranges).
>            Should I set up a single server for each class (and do make package to
>            create packages for each box), or should I just compile ports from source
>            on each box, verifying that I'm installing the same package version each
>            time (which will allow each box to take advantage of the benefits of its
>            specific hardware).
>
>            Those are my two questions, and I'd appreciate any input anyone can
>            provide.  Thanks!
>
>            -Matt
>            _______________________________________________
>            talk mailing list
>            talk at lists.nycbug.org
>            http://lists.nycbug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk
> 
> 
> 
>
>       --
>       - Brian Gupta
>
>       New York City user groups calendar:
>       http://nyc.brandorr.com/
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> --
> - Brian Gupta
> 
> New York City user groups calendar:
> http://nyc.brandorr.com/
> 
> [tooltip_18px_18px.png]
> 
>