[chef] Re: RE: Re: Need cfengine like copy to achieve Self Healing

[Michael Hale < >]

I'm confused about how recursively copying a directory and preserving
permissions provides "self healing". Can you elaborate on how that
feature of cfengine provides self healing in your environment? It is
possible there is a more idiomatic way to accomplish what you are
after in chef.

On Sat, Feb 5, 2011 at 2:06 PM, Steve Caissie 
<
 >
 wrote:
> I can apply the same mode to all of the files in a directory with 
> remote_directory, but I don't see any way to preserve the source 
> directory's permissions.
>
> Ideally, I'd like to be able to copy from a local or remote source and 
> preserve permissions. Cfengine offers this with the copy action.
>
> Steve
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: 
> 
 
>  
> [mailto:
 
>  On Behalf Of Daniel DeLeo
> Sent: Saturday, February 05, 2011 1:24 PM
> To: 
> 
 
> Subject: [chef] Re: Need cfengine like copy to achieve Self Healing
>
> On Sat, Feb 5, 2011 at 9:59 AM, Steve Caissie 
> <
 >
>  wrote:
>> I'm trying to make my systems self healing with chef. I've been doing this
>> for many years with cfengine. I think chef needs a cfengine like copy
>> resource to make it easier to maintain a self healing environment.
>>
>>
>>
>> In cfengine 2, the copy action has a recursive option that lets you 
>> preserve
>> permissions and create classes if files were changed.  There doesn't appear
>> to be any resource to do this in chef.  You could use a tar file to 
>> preserve
>> permissions, but then the copy isn't idempotent.  There would be no easy 
>> way
>> to tell if files on the destination system have changed.  You could put the
>> files into a package like an rpm, but those packages are more difficult to
>> maintain.  I have a lot of directories that I need to copy and maintain.  I
>> don't want to create an rpm for every directory.
>>
>>
>>
>> It would also be nice if chef didn't have to import all of the files you
>> want to copy.  I'd like to be able to change a directory tree without 
>> having
>> to tell Chef about the change.
>>
>>
>>
>> To get around this limitation, I'm going to try to create an "rsync" LWRP 
>> in
>> chef.
>
> Can you explain a bit more about how what you're looking for differs
> from the existing remote directory[1] resource? Do you just want a
> remote directory that uses a local (i.e., already exists elsewhere on
> the filesystem) source? Do you need permissions that are more varied
> than remote directory provides?
>
>
>>
>> Steve Caissie
>> Director of Operations
>>
>> Vlingo
>>
>>
>
> Thanks,
> Dan DeLeo
>