If you have configuration files managed by Puppet – e.g. my.cnf for MySQL, php.ini for PHP, or Nginx files – be sure to add a comment at the top of the files informing readers of those files that they are managed by Puppet and any changes will be overwritten. This will prevent someone unfamiliar with the server’s configuration or with Puppet from wasting hours wondering why their changes disappear.

Example Nginx file:

# This file is managed by Puppet. All changes will be overwritten. server { # ... }

2. Have an apply file

Create a file called apply that runs puppet apply with all the correct parameters for your environment. This will save you typing time, prevent typos, and documents how to run the Puppet apply command. Add $* at the end of the command to preserve any parameters you use when calling ./apply (parameters) .

Example:

#!/bin/bash sudo puppet apply manifests/site.pp \ --modulepath modules/:~/.puppet/modules $*

Note: in --modulepath , a colon ( : ) works like the Unix $PATH – it is a seperator for multiple directories.

Make sure your apply file is executable with chmod +x apply .

3. Use puppet-lint

puppet-lint is a tool that’s checks your manifests for violations from the standard Puppet style. To install it, on Debian/Ubuntu run sudo apt-get install puppet-lint , or on CentOS run sudo yum install puppet-lint . Like the apply file above, you should create a lint file that runs puppet-lint with your desired configuration. For my projects, I disable some linting options, like the 80-character line length limit.

I configure my lint files to exit with status code 1 (which indicates failure in Unix terminology) if there are any errors. This allows you to use it as a Git pre-commit hook.

An example lint file:

#!/bin/bash files = $( find . -type f | grep \. pp $ ) exit_status = 0 for f in $files ; do errors = $( puppet-lint $f --no-80chars-check --no-arrow_alignment-check --no-documentation-check ) if [[ $errors != '' ]] ; then echo " $f :" echo $errors echo exit_status = 1 fi done exit $exit_status

To use this file as a Git pre-commit hook, run ln -s ../../lint .git/hooks/pre-commit . Make sure your lint file is executable with chmod +x lint .

4. Define Puppet’s execution $PATH

By default, to run commands in exec blocks, you must use full paths, for example:

exec { '/bin/cp config.sample config' : }

To avoid having to write the full path to each executable like /bin/cp , define Puppet’s execution $PATH at the start of your base manifest:

Exec { path => '/bin:/usr/bin' }

5. Save lines with arrays

Instead of this verbose manifest code:

package { 'mysql-server' : ensure => present , } package { 'mysql-client' : ensure => present , }

You can combine these into one statement:

package { [ 'mysql-server' , 'mysql-client' ]: ensure => present , }

This also works with files and services: