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README

[[!meta title="cdist - configuration management"]]

[[!toc levels=2]]

## Introduction

cdist configures your system and is similar to
other configuration management systems like
[cfengine](http://www.cfengine.org/),
[bcfg2](http://trac.mcs.anl.gov/projects/bcfg2),
[chef](http://wiki.opscode.com/display/chef/)
and [puppet](http://www.puppetlabs.com/), but
it ticks differently:

* cdist sticks completly to the KISS (keep it simple and stupid) paradigma
* cdist's core is very small (< 1k lines of code)
* There is only one type to extend cdist called ***type***.
* One main development target: ***It must be incredible easy to add new types.***
* cdist is UNIX
* It reuses existing tools like cat, find, mv, ...
* cdist's documentation is bundled as manpages
* cdist is written in POSIX shell
* No special requirements like high level interpreters needed on server or target

### Architecture

* Push mode (server pushes configuration)
* Pull mode planned (client triggers configuration)
* User defines configuration in shell scripts (called ***manifests***)
* Generates internal configuration (cconfig style)
* Uses ***types*** to generate code be executed on the target
* And finally executes the code on the target / applies the configuration

### Features

Stuff that should probably be included in every configuration management,
but is not. Or: The reason why I began to write cdist.

* Speed
* Elegant code
* Clean design
* Good documentation (man pages)
* Meaningful error messages
* No surprise factor
* Consistency in behaviour, naming and documentation
* Easy integration nacked installations
* Simple and well-known DSL: posix shell
* It is very easy to
* extend cdist
* debug cdist-core and cdist-types
* Focus on reuse of existing functionality
* ssh
* sh
* find, rm, ...

## Requirements

### Server

* A posix like shell
* SSH-Client

### Client ("target host")

* A posix like shell
* SSH-Server


## Getting cdist

You can clone cdist from git, which gives you the advantage of having
a version control in place for development of your own stuff as well.

### Installation

To install cdist, execute the following commands:

git clone git://git.schottelius.org/cdist
cd cdist
export PATH=$PATH:$(pwd -P)/bin

# If you want the manpages
make man
export MANPATH=$MANPATH:$(pwd -P)/doc/man


Afterwards you can run ***cdist-quickstart*** to get an impression on
how to use cdist.

### Available versions

There are at least two branches available:

* master: the development branch
* 1.0: stable branch of version 1.0

Other branches may be available as well for features or bugfixes, but they
may vanish at any point. To select a specific branch use

# Generic code
git checkout -b <name> origin/<name>

# Stay on version 1.0
git checkout -b 1.0 origin/1.0

### Update

To upgrade cdist in the current branch use

git pull

# Also update the manpages
make man
export MANPATH=$MANPATH:$(pwd -P)/doc/man


The version branches are designed to change if there are incompatibilities.
Or the other way round: As long as you stay on 1.0 and do git pull, nothing
should break.

## Support

### IRC

You can join the development ***IRC channel***
[#cLinux on irc.freenode.org](irc://irc.freenode.org/#cLinux).

### Mailing list

Bug reports, questions, patches, etc. should be send to the
[cdist mailing list](http://l.schottelius.org/mailman/listinfo/cdist).