How to start with Puppet (system config management tool): useful links and resources

Puppet is a¹⁾ powerful open source tool to automate the configuration of and software management on Unix-like²⁾ operating systems. This posting is a distillate of the resources I collected during my Puppet learning phase. I hope it helps to get an overview about what Puppet can do for you and how to use it (plus providing existing Puppet users some new ideas or tips).

Selected slides and presentations (overview, use-cases, experts, tips)

• Puppet for dummies - ZendCon 2011 Edition
• Developing infrastructures with Puppet (JS slides, use the ← and → key)
• Being a Puppet Master: Automating Amazon EC2 with Puppet & Friends
• Puppet 101 - Puppet @ Stanford University
• Lessons learned when introducing puppet in an existing large scale corporate environment
• Puppet at Loggly
• One-Man Ops with Puppet & Friends
• Are we compliant?
• A Puppet Approach To Application Deployment And Automation In Nokia
• Puppet Modules Standards and Interoperability
• Kickstart & Puppet, Booking.com
• Puppet at High Scale

How to start

• Puppet Labs Docs: Learning Puppet, especially “Part one: Serverless Puppet” teaches the basics.
• Puppet Labs Docs: Language Guide
• Puppet CookBook - A collection of task oriented solutions in Puppet
• http://docs.puppetlabs.com/ in general, especially Reference Shelf and Puppet Guides
• Puppet Wiki: Documentation Start
• Variable Scope and Puppet as of 2.7

Puppet vs. [insert other tool here]

• Comparison of open source configuration management software
• Puppet versus Chef: 10 reasons why Puppet wins
• What are the right questions to ask when deciding whether to use Chef or Puppet?
• CFEngine vs Puppet

“Masterless” (Puppet without central server)

• Global vs local puppet management
• Scaling Puppet with Git
• Puppet at Loggly
• Master-less: What do I lose?

Source code standards

• Puppet Labs Code Style Guide
• Puppet Manifest Documentation³⁾
• Puppet References

Source code tools

• Geppetto: A Puppet IDE (Eclipse)
• Puppet editing like a pro
• Puppet versioning like a pro

Testing

• Puppet Wiki: Testing
• Testing Modules in the Puppet Forge
• Verifying Puppet: Checking Syntax and Writing Automated Tests
• Puppet unit testing like a pro
• rspec-puppet README
• Tests, Example42's foo module

Useful source code, modules, blue prints, examples, inspiration

• Example42
• Puppet Wiki: Complete Configuration, Git repository of David Schmit
• Puppet Labs GitHub Account
• Camptocamp.com GitHub Account
• immerda.ch gitweb
• puzzle.ch gitweb
• Puppet Forge

Design patterns, module organization strategies

• Puppet Modules Standards and Interoperability (JS slides, use the ← and → key)
• Using Parameterized Classes
• Why should I use a puppet parameterized class?
• ReUse Your (Puppet) Modules!
• Stanford Puppet Best Practices
• Understanding Example42 modules
• Customize Example42 Puppet Modules
• The next generation of Example42 Puppet modules
• Best practices on organizing modules
• Managing resource dependencies
• Puppet Labs Source Code Standard / Style Guide
• Puppet versioning like a pro
• Design Pattern for Dealing with Data

Puppet security (basic thoughts)

• Puppet Security and Network Topologies
• Securing and Extending Puppet for World Domination (JS slides, use the ← and → key)
• Puppet at High Scale
• Managing sensitive strings with puppet
• Secret variables in Puppet with Hiera and GPG

Miscellaneous but useful

• Automatic Monitoring with Puppet and Nagios
• Puppet source file trick
• Cobbler - the Linux install and update server
• Alerting on Failed Puppet Status
• Deploy our own software using Puppet?
• CentOS 6 + Puppet 2.7 + mCollective + Foreman + RabbitMQ + Apache + Passenger
• Puppet errors explained
• Puppet Labs Docs: Passenger

Starting points to find more useful content:

• Presentations and slides:
  • Puppet Labs on SlidesShare, YouTube and Vimeo
  • Puppet Camp (provides links to presentations hold at previous camps)
  • Puppet Blog: Videos/Slides from PuppetConf Available
• "Puppet Users" Google Group ( Hint: How to subscribe to a Google Group with a custom email address)
• Planet Puppet
• Planet DevOps: Category puppet
• UnixDaemon Blog: Category /tools/puppet
• Masterzen's Blog
• Server Fault: Tagged with puppet
• Google

• Puppet 2.7 Cookbook
  • Buy it at Amazon.com
  • Buy it at Amazon.de
  • Preview at Google Books
• Pro Puppet
  • Buy it at Amazon.com
  • Buy it at Amazon.de
  • Preview at Google Books

• Puppet Labs provides YUM and APT repositories. If you need a newer Puppet version than the one offered by your distro repository, have a look at yum.puppetlabs.com and apt.puppetlabs.com. You might need to tinker a little bit to get a working repository file.
  Fedora YUM repository example:

  puppetlabs.repo

  [puppetlabs-products-fedora]
  name=Puppet Labs - Products
  baseurl=http://yum.puppetlabs.com/fedora/f\$releasever/products/\$basearch/
  gpgkey=http://yum.puppetlabs.com/RPM-GPG-KEY-puppetlabs
         http://yum.puppetlabs.com/RPM-GPG-KEY-reductive
  enabled=1
  gpgcheck=1
   
  [puppetlabs-dependencies-fedora]
  name=Puppet Labs - Dependencies
  baseurl=http://yum.puppetlabs.com/fedora/f\$releasever/dependencies/\$basearch/
  gpgkey=http://yum.puppetlabs.com/RPM-GPG-KEY-puppetlabs
         http://yum.puppetlabs.com/RPM-GPG-KEY-reductive
  enabled=1
  gpgcheck=1

• Puppet is also useful in very small IT environments like e.g. your home network. Even with only one system to maintain, you may want to automate things e.g. for fast re-installation (a central Puppetmaster server is not mandatory, cf. so called “masterless” mode → puppet apply site.pp). Compare the situation with a source code VCS: Thousands of developers are using something like Git for their source code, even if they are the only developer of a specific project. The reason is that Git is not just a tool for “big teams and corporations”. It provides functionality every developer can benefit from. Same for Puppet: even if you got only a few computers to maintain, you may want to automate things plus documenting your setup by doing so. Puppet provides functionality every administrator can benefit from.