CFEngine 3.6 will be able to parse JSON files making EFL data files more readable.

Continue reading JSON containers improve CFEngine and EFL...

I am frequently asked what I would change in CFEngine if I had the power.

Continue reading Nix ifvarclass and other changes I wish for CFEngine...

Recently my CFEngine colleague Marco Marongiu wrote about classifying CFEngine hosts via external means. His post inspired me to write about classifying hosts using EFL.

Continue reading Bulding CFEngine classes using EFL...

Begun in 1999, OpenNMS an enterprise scale monitoring solution written in Java, with a Postgresql database and configured with XML files. --- Because it uses SNMP OpenNMS can monitor most servers, network gear, and other appliances without needing a custom agent. Its feature list is impressive.

Continue reading OpenNMS: the open source enterprise monitoring solution you've never heard of....

CFEengine 3 bootstrapping can result in the loss of CFEngine 2 inputs. A common strategy to migrate from CFEngine 2 to 3 is to run both in parallel. --- Both versions share the same default inputs directory of /var/cfengine/inputs. A CF3 bootstrap deletes all files in the inputs directory:

[root@atlrhel5is cfengine]# cf-agent -IB hub.example.com 
2013-10-29T12:37:43-0400     info: Removing all files in '/var/cfengine/inputs/'

Now your working CF2 inputs are gone. I've reported a bug about this, but I do not know when or if it will be addressed. As a work around I suggest a wrapper script to your bootstrap procedure. Something like this snippet:

TS=$(date +%s)

mkdir /var/cfengine/inputs-${TS}
cp -r /var/cfengine/inputs/* /var/cfengine/inputs-${TS}

if [ $? -eq 0 ]
   then
      cf-agent -B hub.example.com
      cp -nr /var/cfengine/inputs-${TS}/* /var/cfengine/inputs/
fi

This will preserve and restore your pre-bootstrap inputs, while keeping any new files created by the bootstrap. Be sure to test any bootstrap or upgrade procedure thoroughly. Contact us for more help and information.