Managing Infrastructure with Puppet [Paperback]

James Loope (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 7, 2011

Get started with Puppet, and learn how this popular configuration management framework helps you automate your servers. This concise introduction shows you how to use Puppet’s tools and templates to organize and execute configuration plans on Linux, Unix, and Windows servers. Through code samples and real-world examples, you’ll learn how to manage pools of servers and virtual instances, and how to administer access control. If you’re new to Puppet, but familiar with systems administration and Ruby language basics, this book is the ideal way to start using this open source framework.

• Learn Puppet fundamentals, including its manifest syntax and built-in functions
• Store configurations in a central location with PuppetMaster, and define which configurations apply to which nodes
• Build a framework to create user accounts in place of LDAP or Kerberos KDC
• Apply techniques to execute and manage server configurations with MCollective
• Use Puppet as an auditing tool to ensure that configurations are correct
• Gather information on the nodes you manage with the Facter library

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

James Loope is the Operations Lead at Janrain. He is a specialist in scalable infrastructure, virtualization, cloud infrastructure and computer security.

Product Details

• Paperback: 54 pages
• Publisher: O'Reilly Media (July 7, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1449307639
• ISBN-13: 978-1449307639
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.9 x 0.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 0.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #222,991 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I'm just a new age mechanic, solving problems in the clouds instead of under the hood. Or maybe I'm just a big nerd that loves to see the world spin a little smoother than it did yesterday.

Maybe I should stay away from analogies and metaphors and stick with keeping my business running and my staff sleeping pleasantly through the night.

Oh, and devops.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing, your mileage may vary, July 1, 2011

By 

John Brady (USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Managing Infrastructure with Puppet (Paperback)

Managing Infrastructure with Puppet is an exceptionally short "book" from O'Reilly dealing with the configuration management framework "Puppet".

With a pagecount of 31 in the ebook edition and a listed price of approximately $25.00, that's about eighty cents per page, so my expectations were extremely high regarding this work.

Unfortunately, after installing the Puppet packages on an Ubuntu installation per the instructions on page 1, the example on page 3 failed to work for me, nor did any of the example code. I am not an inexperienced Linux user and yes, I know how to use Google, but I would expect a chapter titled "Getting Started" to have some clue as to things that might go wrong.

There may be wonderful information in this text, but after the initial failures my interest in it's content evaporated. Should I need information on Puppet, I'll consult the development wiki for the product, your mileage may vary with the success of your installation.

Overall disappointing and not recommended.

Disclaimer, I was provided access to an electronic copy of this book by O'Reilly Publishing for review purposes.

5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars 30+ page pamphlet, July 7, 2011

By 

J. Joensuu - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Managing Infrastructure with Puppet (Paperback)

This book has some good information, but with only 32 chapter pages there is really not that much of that. After all the book also attempts to provide an introduction to Puppet and that, besides being available from Puppet Labs, takes away 10 of those pages.

It probably should have been published with the O'Reilly "Pocket Guide" series, but then the price would have been about $10. Which would have been more appropriate.

The one star is just to bring balance to the total rating for this "book".

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good intro to puppet, but lacks depth, July 20, 2011

By 

Kristian Erik Hermansen (San Francisco, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Managing Infrastructure with Puppet (Paperback)

As expected, you can't learn much in ~50 pages. However, it does get you through the most basic tasks. If you want a more detailed dive into Puppet version 2.6+, then check out Pro Puppet, which was recently released. Do NOT purchase the old Puppet book from 2007. It's outdated by now...