[Openstack-devel] GSoC : packaging OpenStack

[Aron Xu]

On Wed, Apr 4, 2012 at 13:21, Thomas Goirand <thomas at goirand.fr> wrote:
> On 04/04/2012 07:03 AM, Loic Dachary wrote:
>>  Hi,
>>
>> There are three submissions now:
>>
>> http://wiki.debian.org/SummerOfCode2012/StudentApplications/AronXu
>> http://wiki.debian.org/SummerOfCode2012/StudentApplications/SyedArmani
>> http://wiki.debian.org/SummerOfCode2012/StudentApplications/shashanksahni
>>
>> and I slightly updated the project to remind of the existence of puppet /
>> chef. It is tempting for a packager to cross the boundary and do work tha
>>t is best done with puppet / chef. At least as much as it is tempting for
>> a puppet module writer to do things such as handling package dependencies
>> using puppet instead of fixing the installation dependencies of the package itself ;-)
>
> Loic,
>
> I don't think the project would be as interesting if it depends on
> puppet or chef. IMHO, we'd be better without it. We have debconf for a
> asking the relevant questions, and I believe it should be enough to make
> sensible configuration in nova/swift/glance.
>
> Also, other people are already working on chef/puppet.
>
> One of the ways I'd see this project would be simply having few meta
> packages that would pull the needed dependencies, and enhanced debconf
> questions and configuration. That's it.
>
> Yes, *on top* of the above, we can have chef / puppet stuff, but it
> shouldn't, IMO, be mandatory for this GoC project. We should be able to
> install openstack only with apt.
>
> That's only my view of it though, I'd welcome you to say otherwise and
> explain why! :)
>
> Cheers,
>
> Thomas
>

I agree on Thomas's point of view, that is to say our packages should
not rely on puppet/chef even if using them can be a good idea for
larger deployments.

The most visible drawback of relying on puppet/chef is making the
package not apt-get friendly anymore. Think about other server
components in Debian, for example, web servers, ftp servers, etc.
Almost all of them are giving some sensible configuration pieces (and
maybe defaults) for users to deploy their service very easily using
`apt-get install ${something}` and briefly edit the configuration
according to the comments in it.

If the user have higher demands on specific use case, then any complex
examples become less helpful because they have to plan their own, and
what they really need is common configuration advices/practice.


-- 
Regards,
Aron Xu