Puppet users - Oct 2013 - Managing /etc/hosts without using exported resources

Hi All,

I am using Puppet 3.2.4 and I''d like Puppet to manage /etc/hosts for me
and
add "neighbouring hosts" only to /etc/hosts. These hosts are
determined to
be neighbours based on where they are (city/country).

For example ($::city and $::country are custom facts):

@@host { $::fqdn:
   ip           => $::ipaddress,
   host_aliases => [ $::hostname ],
   tag          => [ $::city, $::country ],
}

Host <<| tag == $::city and tag == $::country |>>

As I have never used exported resources before, I gave this a try and
realised there is more to them than the above config. It looks like I need
to install PuppetDB to make it work, which looks challenging given that the
puppet master is on SLES 11.

Apart from using exported resources, does anyone have any ideas on how to
achieve this?

One nasty way of doing it was to create a Puppet function that looks at
/var/lib/puppet/yaml/node/*.yaml and matches filenames based on a regex
passed in as an argument, then parses each yaml file and returns
''ipaddress'', ''fqdn'' and
''hostname'' from them to update /etc/hosts, but it''s
way too hacky for my liking.

- Gonzalo

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Hi Gonzalo,

First of all you don''t need puppetdb to use exported resources. A
simple
mysql database will do it, even sqlite works, not recommended though. 
Specifically what you need is "stored configs" configured in your
puppet
master. The problem with exported resources is that sometimes they can be 
slow... depends obviously on the amount of nodes, resources, etc.

Regarding your question if it can be done in a different way... I would 
definitely use DNS if possible... if not exported resources if very easy to 
implement. The function idea I don''t think is "that" bad... I
would prefer
to query a database rather than parsing files. 

Another way I can think about is to use a custom ENC to export those 
parameter. The ENC would take the information from some type of database 
that you have to update as well. That would be definitely faster and a more 
elegant solution

Depending on the size of your infrastructure and performance I would go for 
exported resources and if that is too slow I would consider some of the 
other options

Cheers

Juan

On Monday, October 14, 2013 7:19:56 AM UTC+1, Gonzalo
wrote:
>
> Hi All,
>
> I am using Puppet 3.2.4 and I''d like Puppet to manage /etc/hosts
for me
> and add "neighbouring hosts" only to /etc/hosts. These hosts are
determined
> to be neighbours based on where they are (city/country).
>
> For example ($::city and $::country are custom facts):
>
> @@host { $::fqdn:
>    ip           => $::ipaddress,
>    host_aliases => [ $::hostname ],
>    tag          => [ $::city, $::country ],
> }
>
> Host <<| tag == $::city and tag == $::country |>>
>
> As I have never used exported resources before, I gave this a try and 
> realised there is more to them than the above config. It looks like I need 
> to install PuppetDB to make it work, which looks challenging given that the
> puppet master is on SLES 11.
>
> Apart from using exported resources, does anyone have any ideas on how to 
> achieve this?
>
> One nasty way of doing it was to create a Puppet function that looks at 
> /var/lib/puppet/yaml/node/*.yaml and matches filenames based on a regex 
> passed in as an argument, then parses each yaml file and returns 
> ''ipaddress'', ''fqdn'' and
''hostname'' from them to update /etc/hosts, but it''s
> way too hacky for my liking.
>
> - Gonzalo
>
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----- Original Message -----
> From: "JuanBrein" <juan.brein@gmail.com>
> To: puppet-users@googlegroups.com
> Sent: Monday, October 14, 2013 12:45:05 PM
> Subject: [Puppet Users] Re: Managing /etc/hosts without using exported
resources
> 
> Hi Gonzalo,
> 
> First of all you don''t need puppetdb to use exported resources. A
simple
> mysql database will do it, even sqlite works, not recommended though.
> Specifically what you need is "stored configs" configured in your
puppet
> master. The problem with exported resources is that sometimes they can be
> slow... depends obviously on the amount of nodes, resources, etc.
note the old stored configs are deprecated and will be removed real soon, 
would not recommend you head down that route at this point.

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Hi Juan,

Thanks for your reply. I was going to look into using stored configs with
MySQL as per your suggestion, until I saw R.I.Pienaar''s email :(

Yes, I would certainly use DNS if I could, but unfortunately DNS is not an
option in this setup.

I think I will have to either parse files (eek) or maybe look into that ENC
suggestion.

- Gonzalo


On Mon, Oct 14, 2013 at 10:45 PM, JuanBrein <juan.brein@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Gonzalo,
>
> First of all you don''t need puppetdb to use exported resources. A
simple
> mysql database will do it, even sqlite works, not recommended though.
> Specifically what you need is "stored configs" configured in your
puppet
> master. The problem with exported resources is that sometimes they can be
> slow... depends obviously on the amount of nodes, resources, etc.
>
> Regarding your question if it can be done in a different way... I would
> definitely use DNS if possible... if not exported resources if very easy to
> implement. The function idea I don''t think is "that"
bad... I would prefer
> to query a database rather than parsing files.
>
> Another way I can think about is to use a custom ENC to export those
> parameter. The ENC would take the information from some type of database
> that you have to update as well. That would be definitely faster and a more
> elegant solution
>
> Depending on the size of your infrastructure and performance I would go
> for exported resources and if that is too slow I would consider some of the
> other options
>
> Cheers
>
> Juan
>
>
> On Monday, October 14, 2013 7:19:56 AM UTC+1, Gonzalo wrote:
>>
>> Hi All,
>>
>> I am using Puppet 3.2.4 and I''d like Puppet to manage
/etc/hosts for me
>> and add "neighbouring hosts" only to /etc/hosts. These hosts
are determined
>> to be neighbours based on where they are (city/country).
>>
>> For example ($::city and $::country are custom facts):
>>
>> @@host { $::fqdn:
>>    ip           => $::ipaddress,
>>    host_aliases => [ $::hostname ],
>>    tag          => [ $::city, $::country ],
>> }
>>
>> Host <<| tag == $::city and tag == $::country |>>
>>
>> As I have never used exported resources before, I gave this a try and
>> realised there is more to them than the above config. It looks like I
need
>> to install PuppetDB to make it work, which looks challenging given that
the
>> puppet master is on SLES 11.
>>
>> Apart from using exported resources, does anyone have any ideas on how
to
>> achieve this?
>>
>> One nasty way of doing it was to create a Puppet function that looks at
>> /var/lib/puppet/yaml/node/*.**yaml and matches filenames based on a
>> regex passed in as an argument, then parses each yaml file and returns
>> ''ipaddress'', ''fqdn'' and
''hostname'' from them to update /etc/hosts, but it''s
>> way too hacky for my liking.
>>
>> - Gonzalo
>>
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>
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