4.9.1. HOWTO Setup a SIMP Control Repository

A control repository contains the modules, hieradata, and roles/profiles required in a Puppet infrastructure. Managing the control repo with GIT allows sysadmins to utilize a workflow when updating and developing their infrastructure.

Note

Refer to Puppet, Inc’s control repository documentation for more information.

SIMP distributes a partial control repository:

  • On the filesystem of an installed SIMP system:
$ tree -L 1 /usr/share/simp/environments/simp/
/usr/share/simp/environments/simp/
├── environment.conf
├── FakeCA
├── hieradata
├── manifests
└── modules

$ tree -L 1 src/assets/simp-environment/environments/simp
src/assets/simp-environment/environments/simp
├── environment.conf
├── hieradata/
└── manifests/

To begin creating your control repository, make a directory, say r10k_production, and copy in the contents of the simp-environment-skeleton or environments/simp from a live system, depending on your needs.

Modules are defined in a Puppetfile. We keep up-to-date Puppetfiles in the base of our simp-core repository. For best results, download Puppetfile.stable to the base of the r10k_production directory, using the following snippet:

$ curl -o Puppetfile https://github.com/simp/simp-core/blob/<release>/Puppetfile.stable

Note

The example Puppetfile is labeled stable, meaning that the versions of the modules it contains are the ones contained in the last SIMP release. You can go to any previous release and download a Puppetfile with references to older modules from the git history of the simp-core repo.

Our Puppetfile pulls down every dependency SIMP needs, including more than just Puppet modules. Remove non-Puppet modules by editing the downloaded Puppetfile and erasing the lines moduledir 'src' to moduledir 'src/puppet/modules.

If want your data layer to be SIMP-like, create a hiera.yaml file at the base of the r10k_production directory, and add the following content:

Note

For more information about data in SIMP, see the Classification and Data documentation.

---

# This is the default hiera.yaml file
# Feel free to modify the hierarchy to suit your needs but please
# leave the simp* entries in place at the bottom of the list
:backends:
  - 'yaml'
  - 'json'
:hierarchy:
  - 'hosts/%{trusted.certname}'
  - 'hosts/%{facts.fqdn}'
  - 'hosts/%{facts.hostname}'
  - 'domains/%{facts.domain}'
  - '%{facts.os.family}'
  - '%{facts.os.name}/%{facts.os.release.full}'
  - '%{facts.os.name}/%{facts.os.release.major}'
  - '%{facts.os.name}'
  - 'hostgroups/%{::hostgroup}'
  - 'default'
  - 'compliance_profiles/%{::compliance_profile}'
  - 'simp_config_settings'
  - 'scenarios/%{::simp_scenario}'
:logger: 'puppet'
# When specifying a datadir:
# # 1) Make sure the directory exists
# # 2) Make sure the directory reflects the hierarchy
:yaml:
  :datadir: '/etc/puppetlabs/code/environments/%{::environment}/hieradata'
:json:
  :datadir: '/etc/puppetlabs/code/environments/%{::environment}/hieradata'

Run git init . at the base of the r10k_production directory and commit changes to a production branch. Push the production branch to a repository of your choosing.