Workflow story –
theory versus practice
in Large Enterprises

Marcin Piebiak
Solutions Architect
Linux Polska Sp. z o.o.
1
What is it?
●

Resources

A lot of ready to use resources:
• user
• group
• host
• cron
• exec
• file
• package
• service
• ...

package { 'ssh':
ensure => 'installed',
name
=> 'openssh-server',
}
service { 'ssh':
ensure => 'running',
name
=> 'sshd',
require => Package['ssh'],
}

• Resources are building blocks.
• They can be combined to make larger components.
• Together they can model the expected state of your system.
2
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
●

package { 'ssh':
ensure => 'installed',
name
=> 'openssh-server',
}
service { 'ssh':
ensure => 'running',
name
=> 'sshd',
}

Rather than listing a series of steps to carry out
we can describe the desired final state only.
3
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
● Abstraction
●

package { 'ssh':
ensure => 'installed',
name
=> 'openssh-server',
}

root@debian ~]# apt-get install openssh-server
root@redhat ~]# yum install openssh-server

Resources in Puppet are
abstracted from
underlying providers.
4
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
● Abstraction
● Facts
●

Puppet uses facter to gather
information about the host system.
root@redhat ~]# facter
architecture => x86_64
domain => linuxpolska.pl
facterversion => 1.5.2
fqdn => redhat.linuxpolska.pl
hardwaremodel => x86_64
hostname => redhat
interfaces => eth0
ipaddress => 172.16.10.1
kernel => Linux
...

5

Custom Facts
Facter.add('role') do
setcode do
'cat /etc/role'
end
end
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
● Abstraction
● Facts
● Data separation
●

Puppet uses Hiera as its single source
of truth data abstraction layer.

$pkg_name = hiera('pkg_name')
package { 'apache':
ensure => 'installed',
name
=> $pkg_name,
}
Hiera uses Facter facts to determine
a hierarchy.
6

--:backends:
- yaml
:yaml:
:datadir:/etc/hiera
:hierarchy:
- %{fqdn}
- %{osfamily}
- %{environment}
- common
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
● Abstraction
● Facts
● Data separation
● Reusable code
●

class ssh (
$pkg_name = 'openssh-server',
$srv_name = 'sshd',
) {
package { 'ssh':
ensure => 'installed',
name
=> $pkg_name,
}

}
7

service {
ensure
enable
name
require
}

'ssh':
=> 'running',
=> 'true',
=> $srv_name,
=> Package['ssh'],

Classes define a
collection of
resources that
are managed
together as a
single unit.
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
● Abstraction
● Facts
● Data separation
● Reusable code
●

Classes are abstracted by modules:
ssh
├──
│
│
├──
│
└──

manifests
├── init.pp
└── server.pp
files
└── ssh_config
templates
└── sshd_config.erb

Modules are directories that contain your
configuration. They are designed to encapsulate all
of the components related to a given configuration in
a single folder hierarchy.
8
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
● Abstraction
● Facts
● Data separation
● Reusable code
●

If a more complex deployment is
needed, reusing existing classes
saves effort and reduces error.

9
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
● Abstraction
● Facts
● Data separation
● Reusable code
●

You own abstraction layers...
Profiles:
class profiles::application {
include tomcat
include mysql
include myapp
}
class profiles::base {
include ssh
include ntp
include users
}
Roles:
class role::webapp {
include profiles::base
include profiles::customapp
include profiles::test_tools
}
10
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
● Abstraction
● Facts
● Data separation
● Reusable code
● Supports many OS
●

Supported OS

11
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
● Abstraction
● Facts
● Data separation
● Reusable code
● Supports many OS
●

Big environment – no problem

Changes?
base/ntp.yaml
--ntp::local_servers:
- 192.168.0.45
+ - 192.168.0.1
12
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
● Abstraction
● Facts
● Data separation
● Reusable code
● Supports many OS
● Provisioning
● Orchestration
● Puppet Forge
● Live Management
● Environments
● Reporting
● Dry-run mode
●

And more...
VM/Cloud Provisioning
Live Management
Orchestration
MCollective
Environments
Dry-run mode
13

Reporting
Custom:
- types & providers
- facts
- functions
What is it?
Resources
● Declarative language
Thanks to these all superior features, ● Abstraction
Puppet is:
● Facts
- fast in deployment
● Data separation
- easy to use
- universal for a lot of operating systems ● Reusable code
● Supports many OS
- with unlimited possibilities
● Provisioning
- easy to expand
- flexible
● Orchestration
● Puppet Forge
● Live Management
● Environments
● Reporting
● Dry-run mode
●

14
In large enterprises like banks, telco, insurance, etc. those features
are not the most relevant.
Implementing Puppet in enterprises we must consider another
priority map, another mindset.

VS.

We must answer not trivial questions dealing
with the core IT Departments way of work.
15
So... everyone has
access to everything?!

VS.

16
So... can I destroy
the whole infrastructure
from one place?

VS.

17
Solution
Puppet master installation
on hardened system with
limited direct access.

tcp:8140

RBAC

tcp:443

tcp:22

ssh keys

For maintenance.
18
Solution
Release manager

Pull request

developer
developer

Fetch

Git as a communication
layer between developers
and puppet master.
19

developer
So... everyone now must
use puppet?!

VS.

20
Developers

Solution
Systems
administrators

Databases
administrators

Security
department

On beginning each department
can have own environments.
21
Each department can have
many environments and its
own idea how to organize
work with puppet.

Solution
Security
department

Integrator

Tests
integrator

dev
test
prod
Release
manager

22
Each department can have
many environments and its
own idea how to organize
work with puppet.

Solution
Security
department

Integrator

Tests
integrator
Release

v0.1

v0.2

dev
test
prod
commits

23

Release
manager
Developers

Solution
Systems
administrators

Databases
administrators

integrator
Security
department

After time some departments will start
working together in one environment.
24
Developers

Solution
Systems
administrators

Databases
administrators

integrator
Security
department
integrator

25
Developers

Solution
Systems
administrators

Databases
administrators

integrator
Security
department
integrator

At the end all departments will use
one environment.
26
How can I find out
who made what change
and who approved
this modification?

VS.

27
Using git we have:
● date
● author
● description

Solution
commit 220938c5a2e51ecd4166eb7d75d14974cbcff897
Author: Marcin Piebiak <mpp@linuxpolska.pl>
Date:
Fri Jul 5 11:27:43 2013 +0200
Description....

Person who approved
modifications.

Release

v0.1

dev
test
prod

28

v0.2

We can use git as a
place for history of the
infrastructure.
● git status
● git log
● git diff
commits
● git blame
Git history is cryptographically secured.
If I have a lot of
environments how can
I use them?

VS.

29
Solution
We can specify a set of
environments for each host to
use.

Database testing system, uses
three testing environments from
different departments.
tcp:8140

dev
test
prod

30
Great!
But... using command
line I can connect to
different environments!

VS.

31
Solution
We use imp module, to control
puppet agents behavior and
their access to environments.

puppet agent -t --environment
tcp:8140

32
Solution
puppet.conf
[main]
modulepath = /etc/puppetlabs/puppet/modules:/opt/puppet/share/puppet/modules
manifest
= /etc/puppetlabs/manifests/site.pp
[env_sec_prod]
modulepath = /var/lib/git/env_sec_prod/modules:/etc/puppetlabs/puppet/modules:/opt/puppet/share/puppet/modules
[env_sec_test]
modulepath = /var/lib/git/env_sec_test/modules:/etc/puppetlabs/puppet/modules:/opt/puppet/share/puppet/modules

/etc/puppetlabs/puppet/modules – place for modules from forge and well tested modules and module imp
/var/lib/git/$environment/modules – git repository for environment

/etc/puppetlabs/manifests/site.pp - common manifest for all environments

imp.yaml

site.pp
include imp
hiera_include('include')

33

--imp::environments:
env_sec_prod:
order: 'deny,allow'
deny: 'all'
allow:
- 'host1.linuxpolska.lab'
- 'www.*.linuxpolska.lab'
commiters:
- 'john.smith'
priority: 1
How can I audit
changes made in
the infrastructure?

VS.

34
Puppet reports

Solution

When nodes fetch their
configurations from the puppet
master, they send back
inventory data and a report of
their run.

puppet reports

Log collector
and analyzer.
35
How can puppet help
me with audit? How can
I recreate life cycle
of each host?

VS.

36
Solution

puppet reports
● puppet agents catalog
● hosts facts
● git diffs after commit
● hiera configuration for
each host
● filebuckets
● ...
●

Log collector
and analyzer.
37
Solution
file {'/etc/important':
ensure => 'file',
group => 'apache',
mode
=> '0660',
}
app

db

file {'/etc/important':
ensure => 'file',
user
=> 'root',
group => 'root',
mode
=> '0600',
}
system

security

If we have many environment there is always
risk of overwriting someone's changes.

Log collector
and analyzer.
38
How will the
modification in puppet
manifests
affect the whole
infrastructure?

VS.

39
Solution
Using log collector we can analyze the infrastructure modifications
before they get to production environment.
Report from puppet normal run.
Report from puppet dry-run.

v0.1

v0.2

dev
test
prod
commits

Log collector
and analyzer.
40
All changes are made
automatically? First I would
like to see what is
going to be changed.

VS.

41
How can we rollback
changes?

VS.

42
After we install
puppet will we know
everything about
the infrastructure?

VS.

43
THE END

Marcin Piebiak
Solutions Architect
Linux Polska Sp. z o.o.
44

Workflow story: Theory versus Practice in large enterprises by Marcin Piebiak

  • 1.
    Workflow story – theoryversus practice in Large Enterprises Marcin Piebiak Solutions Architect Linux Polska Sp. z o.o. 1
  • 2.
    What is it? ● Resources Alot of ready to use resources: • user • group • host • cron • exec • file • package • service • ... package { 'ssh': ensure => 'installed', name => 'openssh-server', } service { 'ssh': ensure => 'running', name => 'sshd', require => Package['ssh'], } • Resources are building blocks. • They can be combined to make larger components. • Together they can model the expected state of your system. 2
  • 3.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language ● package { 'ssh': ensure => 'installed', name => 'openssh-server', } service { 'ssh': ensure => 'running', name => 'sshd', } Rather than listing a series of steps to carry out we can describe the desired final state only. 3
  • 4.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language ● Abstraction ● package { 'ssh': ensure => 'installed', name => 'openssh-server', } root@debian ~]# apt-get install openssh-server root@redhat ~]# yum install openssh-server Resources in Puppet are abstracted from underlying providers. 4
  • 5.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language ● Abstraction ● Facts ● Puppet uses facter to gather information about the host system. root@redhat ~]# facter architecture => x86_64 domain => linuxpolska.pl facterversion => 1.5.2 fqdn => redhat.linuxpolska.pl hardwaremodel => x86_64 hostname => redhat interfaces => eth0 ipaddress => 172.16.10.1 kernel => Linux ... 5 Custom Facts Facter.add('role') do setcode do 'cat /etc/role' end end
  • 6.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language ● Abstraction ● Facts ● Data separation ● Puppet uses Hiera as its single source of truth data abstraction layer. $pkg_name = hiera('pkg_name') package { 'apache': ensure => 'installed', name => $pkg_name, } Hiera uses Facter facts to determine a hierarchy. 6 --:backends: - yaml :yaml: :datadir:/etc/hiera :hierarchy: - %{fqdn} - %{osfamily} - %{environment} - common
  • 7.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language ● Abstraction ● Facts ● Data separation ● Reusable code ● class ssh ( $pkg_name = 'openssh-server', $srv_name = 'sshd', ) { package { 'ssh': ensure => 'installed', name => $pkg_name, } } 7 service { ensure enable name require } 'ssh': => 'running', => 'true', => $srv_name, => Package['ssh'], Classes define a collection of resources that are managed together as a single unit.
  • 8.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language ● Abstraction ● Facts ● Data separation ● Reusable code ● Classes are abstracted by modules: ssh ├── │ │ ├── │ └── manifests ├── init.pp └── server.pp files └── ssh_config templates └── sshd_config.erb Modules are directories that contain your configuration. They are designed to encapsulate all of the components related to a given configuration in a single folder hierarchy. 8
  • 9.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language ● Abstraction ● Facts ● Data separation ● Reusable code ● If a more complex deployment is needed, reusing existing classes saves effort and reduces error. 9
  • 10.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language ● Abstraction ● Facts ● Data separation ● Reusable code ● You own abstraction layers... Profiles: class profiles::application { include tomcat include mysql include myapp } class profiles::base { include ssh include ntp include users } Roles: class role::webapp { include profiles::base include profiles::customapp include profiles::test_tools } 10
  • 11.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language ● Abstraction ● Facts ● Data separation ● Reusable code ● Supports many OS ● Supported OS 11
  • 12.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language ● Abstraction ● Facts ● Data separation ● Reusable code ● Supports many OS ● Big environment – no problem Changes? base/ntp.yaml --ntp::local_servers: - 192.168.0.45 + - 192.168.0.1 12
  • 13.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language ● Abstraction ● Facts ● Data separation ● Reusable code ● Supports many OS ● Provisioning ● Orchestration ● Puppet Forge ● Live Management ● Environments ● Reporting ● Dry-run mode ● And more... VM/Cloud Provisioning Live Management Orchestration MCollective Environments Dry-run mode 13 Reporting Custom: - types & providers - facts - functions
  • 14.
    What is it? Resources ●Declarative language Thanks to these all superior features, ● Abstraction Puppet is: ● Facts - fast in deployment ● Data separation - easy to use - universal for a lot of operating systems ● Reusable code ● Supports many OS - with unlimited possibilities ● Provisioning - easy to expand - flexible ● Orchestration ● Puppet Forge ● Live Management ● Environments ● Reporting ● Dry-run mode ● 14
  • 15.
    In large enterpriseslike banks, telco, insurance, etc. those features are not the most relevant. Implementing Puppet in enterprises we must consider another priority map, another mindset. VS. We must answer not trivial questions dealing with the core IT Departments way of work. 15
  • 16.
    So... everyone has accessto everything?! VS. 16
  • 17.
    So... can Idestroy the whole infrastructure from one place? VS. 17
  • 18.
    Solution Puppet master installation onhardened system with limited direct access. tcp:8140 RBAC tcp:443 tcp:22 ssh keys For maintenance. 18
  • 19.
    Solution Release manager Pull request developer developer Fetch Gitas a communication layer between developers and puppet master. 19 developer
  • 20.
    So... everyone nowmust use puppet?! VS. 20
  • 21.
  • 22.
    Each department canhave many environments and its own idea how to organize work with puppet. Solution Security department Integrator Tests integrator dev test prod Release manager 22
  • 23.
    Each department canhave many environments and its own idea how to organize work with puppet. Solution Security department Integrator Tests integrator Release v0.1 v0.2 dev test prod commits 23 Release manager
  • 24.
  • 25.
  • 26.
  • 27.
    How can Ifind out who made what change and who approved this modification? VS. 27
  • 28.
    Using git wehave: ● date ● author ● description Solution commit 220938c5a2e51ecd4166eb7d75d14974cbcff897 Author: Marcin Piebiak <[email protected]> Date: Fri Jul 5 11:27:43 2013 +0200 Description.... Person who approved modifications. Release v0.1 dev test prod 28 v0.2 We can use git as a place for history of the infrastructure. ● git status ● git log ● git diff commits ● git blame Git history is cryptographically secured.
  • 29.
    If I havea lot of environments how can I use them? VS. 29
  • 30.
    Solution We can specifya set of environments for each host to use. Database testing system, uses three testing environments from different departments. tcp:8140 dev test prod 30
  • 31.
    Great! But... using command lineI can connect to different environments! VS. 31
  • 32.
    Solution We use impmodule, to control puppet agents behavior and their access to environments. puppet agent -t --environment tcp:8140 32
  • 33.
    Solution puppet.conf [main] modulepath = /etc/puppetlabs/puppet/modules:/opt/puppet/share/puppet/modules manifest =/etc/puppetlabs/manifests/site.pp [env_sec_prod] modulepath = /var/lib/git/env_sec_prod/modules:/etc/puppetlabs/puppet/modules:/opt/puppet/share/puppet/modules [env_sec_test] modulepath = /var/lib/git/env_sec_test/modules:/etc/puppetlabs/puppet/modules:/opt/puppet/share/puppet/modules /etc/puppetlabs/puppet/modules – place for modules from forge and well tested modules and module imp /var/lib/git/$environment/modules – git repository for environment /etc/puppetlabs/manifests/site.pp - common manifest for all environments imp.yaml site.pp include imp hiera_include('include') 33 --imp::environments: env_sec_prod: order: 'deny,allow' deny: 'all' allow: - 'host1.linuxpolska.lab' - 'www.*.linuxpolska.lab' commiters: - 'john.smith' priority: 1
  • 34.
    How can Iaudit changes made in the infrastructure? VS. 34
  • 35.
    Puppet reports Solution When nodesfetch their configurations from the puppet master, they send back inventory data and a report of their run. puppet reports Log collector and analyzer. 35
  • 36.
    How can puppethelp me with audit? How can I recreate life cycle of each host? VS. 36
  • 37.
    Solution puppet reports ● puppetagents catalog ● hosts facts ● git diffs after commit ● hiera configuration for each host ● filebuckets ● ... ● Log collector and analyzer. 37
  • 38.
    Solution file {'/etc/important': ensure =>'file', group => 'apache', mode => '0660', } app db file {'/etc/important': ensure => 'file', user => 'root', group => 'root', mode => '0600', } system security If we have many environment there is always risk of overwriting someone's changes. Log collector and analyzer. 38
  • 39.
    How will the modificationin puppet manifests affect the whole infrastructure? VS. 39
  • 40.
    Solution Using log collectorwe can analyze the infrastructure modifications before they get to production environment. Report from puppet normal run. Report from puppet dry-run. v0.1 v0.2 dev test prod commits Log collector and analyzer. 40
  • 41.
    All changes aremade automatically? First I would like to see what is going to be changed. VS. 41
  • 42.
    How can werollback changes? VS. 42
  • 43.
    After we install puppetwill we know everything about the infrastructure? VS. 43
  • 44.
    THE END Marcin Piebiak SolutionsArchitect Linux Polska Sp. z o.o. 44