Comments on: Scripted FreeBSD reimaging http://alex.jurkiewi.cz/blog/2009/scripted-freebsd-reimaging Thu, 05 Jan 2012 12:05:46 +1100 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Alex Jurkiewicz http://alex.jurkiewi.cz/blog/2009/scripted-freebsd-reimaging#comment-190 Alex Jurkiewicz Fri, 06 Nov 2009 03:19:40 +0000 http://www.bluebottle.net.au/blog/?p=370#comment-190 edogawaconan: I used bash because the 'cost' (ie, time taken installing the package) is minor and I much prefer the dialect. zfs will only become suitable when (ha!) our production environment moves to zfs as well, it would be far too big of a difference before then. Michael: interesting tool, thanks for the link! I had a quick flick through your writeup and will poke the tool more later. As I understand it, it's sort of an OS-aware rsync-like tool, so there's no support for running arbitrary commands on the client as part of the deploy process? edogawaconan: I used bash because the 'cost' (ie, time taken installing the package) is minor and I much prefer the dialect. zfs will only become suitable when (ha!) our production environment moves to zfs as well, it would be far too big of a difference before then.

Michael: interesting tool, thanks for the link! I had a quick flick through your writeup and will poke the tool more later. As I understand it, it's sort of an OS-aware rsync-like tool, so there's no support for running arbitrary commands on the client as part of the deploy process?

]]> By: Michael Graziano http://alex.jurkiewi.cz/blog/2009/scripted-freebsd-reimaging#comment-186 Michael Graziano Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:45:34 +0000 http://www.bluebottle.net.au/blog/?p=370#comment-186 Interesting traditional approach -- I'll plug my personal approach to a similar problem: radmind (<a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/radmind/" rel="nofollow">http://sourceforge.net/projects/radmind/</a>). We use this at my site to manage deployment and patching of the production environment, and when a dev environment is needed we install a skeletonized OS (FreeBSD + the radmind package), point it at the radmind server and let it deploy as it would in production. When developers make changes we can then run the radmind fsdiff tool and determine exactly what needs to be updated in production. If they reach a point where their system is unusable they can re-apply the production loadset and get back to an exact copy of our production environment. Something from your procedure above that I'm missing is the "rechristen" script to eliminate the need to edit rc.conf and friends (which I intend to steal now). --- My notes on deploying radmind along with some example scripts for the interested: http://www.bsd-box.net/~mikeg/blog/index.php?serendipity%5Baction%5D=search&serendipity%5BsearchTerm%5D=radmind&serendipity%5BsearchButton%5D=%3E Interesting traditional approach -- I'll plug my personal approach to a similar problem: radmind (http://sourceforge.net/projects/radmind/).

We use this at my site to manage deployment and patching of the production environment, and when a dev environment is needed we install a skeletonized OS (FreeBSD + the radmind package), point it at the radmind server and let it deploy as it would in production.

When developers make changes we can then run the radmind fsdiff tool and determine exactly what needs to be updated in production. If they reach a point where their system is unusable they can re-apply the production loadset and get back to an exact copy of our production environment.

Something from your procedure above that I'm missing is the "rechristen" script to eliminate the need to edit rc.conf and friends (which I intend to steal now).

---

My notes on deploying radmind along with some example scripts for the interested: http://www.bsd-box.net/~mikeg/blog/index.php?serendipity%5Baction%5D=search&serendipity%5BsearchTerm%5D=radmind&serendipity%5BsearchButton%5D=%3E

]]> By: edogawaconan http://alex.jurkiewi.cz/blog/2009/scripted-freebsd-reimaging#comment-185 edogawaconan Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:38:02 +0000 http://www.bluebottle.net.au/blog/?p=370#comment-185 Also, when ready, (and when using sufficient system) using zfs for this kind of task would be better. Maybe. Also, when ready, (and when using sufficient system) using zfs for this kind of task would be better. Maybe.

]]> By: edogawaconan http://alex.jurkiewi.cz/blog/2009/scripted-freebsd-reimaging#comment-184 edogawaconan Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:32:55 +0000 http://www.bluebottle.net.au/blog/?p=370#comment-184 I don't see why the scripts require bash o_O I don't see why the scripts require bash o_O

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