NAME

       cdist-quickstart - jump in and enjoy cdist

INTRODUCTION

       This tutorial is aimed at people learning cdist and shows typical approaches as well as gives an easy
       start into the world of configuration management.

       This tutorial assumes you are configuring localhost, because it is always available. Just replace
       localhost with your target host for real life usage.

QUICK START - GET YOUR HANDS DIRTY NOW

       For those who just want to configure a system with the cdist configuration management and do not need (or
       want) to understand everything.

       Cdist uses ssh for communication and transportation and usually logs into the target host as the root
       user. So you need to configure the ssh server of the target host to allow root logins: Edit the file
       /etc/ssh/sshd_config and add one of the following lines:

           # Allow login only via public key
           PermitRootLogin without-password

           # Allow login via password and public key
           PermitRootLogin yes

       As cdist uses ssh intensively, it is recommended to setup authentication with public keys:

           # Generate pubkey pair as a normal user
           ssh-keygen

           # Copy pubkey over to target host
           ssh-copy-id root@localhost

       Have a look at ssh-agent(1) and ssh-add(1) on how to cache the password for your public key. Usually it
       looks like this:

           # Start agent and export variables
           eval `ssh-agent`

           # Add keys (requires password for every identity file)
           ssh-add

       At this point you should be able to ssh root@localhost without re-entering the password. If something
       failed until here, ensure that all steps went successfully and you have read and understood the
       documentation.

       As soon as you are able to login without password to localhost, we can use cdist to configure it. You can
       copy and paste the following code into your shell to get started and configure localhost:

           # Get cdist
           # Mirrors can be found on
           # http://www.nico.schottelius.org/software/cdist/install/#index2h4
           git clone git://git.schottelius.org/cdist

           # Create manifest (maps configuration to host(s)
           cd cdist
           echo '__file /etc/cdist-configured' > cdist/conf/manifest/init

           # Configure localhost in verbose mode
           ./bin/cdist config -v localhost

           # Find out that cdist created /etc/cdist-configured
           ls -l /etc/cdist-configured

       That’s it, you’ve successfully used cdist to configure your first host! Continue reading the next
       sections, to understand what you did and how to create a more sophisticated configuration.

SEE ALSO

       •   cdist(1)

       •   cdist-tutorial(7)

COPYING

       Copyright (C) 2011-2012 Nico Schottelius. Free use of this software is granted under the terms of the GNU
       General Public License version 3 (GPLv3).

AUTHOR

       Nico Schottelius <nico-cdist--@--schottelius.org>
           Author.

                                                   04/07/2016                                CDIST-QUICKSTART(7)