.. -*- mode: rst -*- .. _server-plugins-generators-packages: ======== Packages ======== .. versionadded:: 1.0.0 This page documents the Packages plugin. Packages is an alternative to :ref:`Pkgmgr ` for specifying package entries for clients. Where Pkgmgr explicitly specifies package entry information, Packages delegates control of package version information to the underlying package manager, installing the latest version available through those channels. Limiting sources to groups ========================== `sources.xml`_ processes ```` and ```` tags just like Bundles. In addition to any groups or clients specified that way, clients must be a member of the appropriate architecture group as specified in a Source stanza. In total, in order for a source to be associated with a client, the client must be in any explicit groups or clients specified in `sources.xml`_, and any specified architecture groups. If `"Magic Groups"`_ are enabled, then the client must be a member of a matching magic group as well. Memberships in architecture groups is needed so that Packages can map software sources to clients. There is no other way to handle this than to impose membership in the appropriate architecture group. When multiple sources are specified, clients are associated with each source to which they apply (based on group memberships, as described above). Packages and dependencies are resolved from all applicable sources. .. note:: To recap, a client needs to be a member of the **Architecture** group and any other groups defined in your `sources.xml`_ file in order for the client to be associated to the proper sources. If you are using :ref:`server-plugins-generators-packages-magic-groups`, then a client must also be a member of the appropriate OS group. .. _server-plugins-generators-packages-magic-groups: "Magic Groups" ============== .. deprecated:: 1.3.0 Packages has the ability to use a feature known as "magic groups"; it is the only plugin to use that feature. Most plugins operate based on client group memberships, without any concern for the particular names chosen for groups by the user. The Packages plugin is the sole exception to this rule. Packages needs to "know" two different sorts of facts about clients. The first is the basic OS/distro of the client, enabling classes of sources. The second is the architecture of the client, enabling sources for a given architecture. In addition to these magic groups, each source may also specify non-magic groups to limit the source's applicability to group member clients. +--------+----------+--------------+ | Source | OS Group | Architecture | +========+==========+==============+ | Apt | debian | i386 | +--------+----------+--------------+ | Apt | ubuntu | amd64 | +--------+----------+--------------+ | Apt | nexenta | | +--------+----------+--------------+ | Apt | apt | | +--------+----------+--------------+ | Yum | redhat | i386 | +--------+----------+--------------+ | Yum | centos | x86_64 | +--------+----------+--------------+ | Yum | fedora | | +--------+----------+--------------+ | Yum | yum | | +--------+----------+--------------+ Magic OS groups are disabled by default in Bcfg2 1.3 and greater. If you require magic groups, you can enable them by setting ``magic_groups`` to ``1`` in the ``[packages]`` section of ``bcfg2.conf``. Magic groups will be removed in a future release. Magic architecture groups cannot be disabled. Setup ===== Three basic steps are required for Packages to work properly. #. Create Packages/`sources.xml`_. This file should look approximately like the example below, and describes both which software repositories should be used, and which clients are eligible to use each one. #. Ensure that clients are members of the proper groups. Each client should be a member of all of the groups listed in the `sources.xml` (like ubuntu-intrepid or centos-5.2 in the following examples), one of the architecture groups listed in the source configuration (i386, amd64 or x86_64 in the following examples), and one of the magic groups listed above, if magic groups are enabled. '''Failure to do this will result in the source either not applying to the client, or only architecture independent packages being made available to the client.''' #. Add Package entries to bundles. #. Sit back and relax, as dependencies are resolved, and automatically added to client configurations. sources.xml ----------- ``sources.xml`` is where all package sources are configured for the Packages plugin. It processes ```` and ```` tags just like Bundles. The primary element in ``sources.xml`` is the Source tag: .. xml:element:: Source Handling GPG Keys ----------------- .. versionadded:: 1.2.0 If you have yum libraries installed, Packages can automatically handle GPG signing keys for Yum and Pulp repositories. (You do not need to use the native yum resolver; if yum libraries are available, GPG signing keys can be handled automatically.) Simply specify the URL to the GPG key(s) for a repository with :xml:element:`GPGKey` elements: .. code-block:: xml x86_64 http://mirror.example.com/keys/RPM-GPG-KEY-CentOS-6 More than one ```` tag can be specified per Source. With the keys specified thusly, Packages will include the keys in the generated yum config file, and will ensure that the keys are imported on the client. There is no need to specify ```` tags for :ref:`Pulp sources `; that data is pulled directly from the Pulp REST API. Arbitrary Repo Options ---------------------- .. versionadded:: 1.2.3 You can specify arbitrary options to be added to the repository config on the server side, if you are using the native yum libraries, and on the client side if you are using the ability of Packages to automatically generate your Yum config. To do this, add an :xml:element:`Options` tag to a :xml:element:`Source`; all of its attributes will be added verbatim to the repository in the generated config. For instance: .. code-block:: xml x86_64 If you are using native yum libraries and need to set options only on the Bcfg2 server, you can set the :xml:attribute:`RepoOptionsType:serveronly` attribute to "true"; or, if you need to set options only on the client, you can set the :xml:attribute:`RepoOptionsType:clientonly` attribute to "true". For instance, if your Bcfg2 server needed to use a proxy to access a repo, and you wanted to expire metadata caches very quickly on the client, you could do: .. code-block:: xml x86_64 Prerequisite Resolution ======================= Packages provides a prerequisite resolution mechanism which has no analogue in Pkgmgr. During configuration generation, all structures are processed. After this phase, but before entry binding, a list of packages and the client metadata instance is passed into Packages' resolver. This process determines a superset of packages that will fully satisfy dependencies of all package entries included in structures, and reports any prerequisites that cannot be satisfied. This facility should largely remove the need to use the :ref:`Base ` plugin. Disabling dependency resolution ------------------------------- .. versionadded:: 1.1.0 Dependency resolution can be disabled by adding the following setting to ``bcfg2.conf`` in the ``packages`` section:: [packages] resolver=0 All metadata processing can be disabled as well:: [packages] metadata=0 This setting implies disabling the resolver. Blacklisting faulty dependencies -------------------------------- If you encounter an issue with faulty dependency resolution due to Packages, please file a bug report so that we can fix the problem in future releases. In the meantime, you can work around this issue by blacklisting the offending Package in your Sources. The :xml:element:`Blacklist` element should immediately follow the Component section of your source and should look like the following: .. code-block:: xml unwanted-packagename If you use the built-in :ref:`Yum config generator `, blacklisted packages will be added to the ``exclude`` list for the source. .. _packages-exampleusage: Example usage ============= Create a _`sources.xml` file in the Packages directory that looks something like this: .. code-block:: xml main universe i386 amd64 .. note:: .. versionadded:: 1.1.0 The default behavior of the Packages plugin is to not make any assumptions about which packages you want to have added automatically [#f1]_. For that reason, neither **Recommended** nor **Suggested** packages are added as dependencies by default. You will notice that the default behavior for apt is to add Recommended packages as dependencies. You can configure the Packages plugin to add recommended packages by adding the :xml:attribute:`SourceType:recommended` attribute, e.g.: .. code-block:: xml .. warning:: You must regenerate the Packages cache when adding or removing the recommended attribute (``bcfg2-admin xcmd Packages.Refresh``). .. [#f1] Bcfg2 will by default add **Essential** packages to the client specification. You can disable this behavior by setting the :xml:attribute:`SourceType:essential` attribute to *false*: .. code-block:: xml Yum sources can be similarly specified: .. code-block:: xml os updates extras i386 x86_64 http://mirror.centos.org/centos/RPM-GPG-KEY-CentOS-5 For sources with a :xml:attribute:`SourceType:url` attribute, the :xml:attribute:`SourceType:version` attribute is also necessary. :ref:`Pulp sources ` are very simple to specify due to the amount of data that can be queried from Pulp itself: .. code-block:: xml .. note:: There is also a rawurl attribute for specifying sources that don't follow the conventional layout. .. code-block:: xml x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 .. code-block:: xml amd64 i386 Configuration Updates ===================== Packages will reload its configuration upon an explicit command via bcfg2-admin:: [0:3711] bcfg2-admin xcmd Packages.Refresh True During this command (which will take some time depending on the quantity and size of the sources listed in the configuration file), the server will report information like:: Packages: Updating http://mirror.anl.gov/ubuntu//dists/jaunty/main/binary-i386/Packages.gz Packages: Updating http://mirror.anl.gov/ubuntu//dists/jaunty/main/binary-amd64/Packages.gz Packages: Updating http://mirror.anl.gov/ubuntu//dists/jaunty/universe/binary-i386/Packages.gz Packages: Updating http://mirror.anl.gov/ubuntu//dists/jaunty/universe/binary-amd64/Packages.gz ... Packages: Updating http://mirror.centos.org/centos/5/extras/x86_64/repodata/filelists.xml.gz Packages: Updating http://mirror.centos.org/centos/5/extras/x86_64/repodata/primary.xml.gz One line per file download needed. ``Packages/sources.xml`` will be reloaded at this time, so any source specification changes (new or modified sources in this file) will be reflected by the server at this point. This process is much, much faster if you use the :ref:`native yum library support `. Soft reload ----------- .. versionadded:: 1.2.0 A soft reload can be performed to reread the configuration file and download only missing sources.:: [0:3711] bcfg2-admin xcmd Packages.Reload True This is done automatically any time `sources.xml`_ is updated. Availability ============ Support for clients using yum and apt is currently available. Support for other package managers (Portage, Zypper, IPS, etc) remain to be added. Package Checking and Verification ================================= In order to do disable per-package verification, you will need to use :ref:`BoundEntries `, e.g.: .. code-block:: xml .. _generating-client-configs: Generating Client APT/Yum Configurations ======================================== The Packages plugin has native support for generating Yum and Apt configs. Simply add entries like these to the appropriate bundles: .. code-block:: xml If you want to change the path to either of those files, you can set ``yum_config`` or ``apt_config`` in ``bcfg2.conf`` to the path to the config files you want to generate:: [packages] yum_config=/etc/yum.repos.d/all.repo apt_config=/etc/apt/sources.d/all If you need to distribute a config to different places on different hosts, you can use the :ref:`server-plugins-structures-altsrc` attribute, e.g.: .. code-block:: xml See :ref:`configuration` for more details on these options. .. note:: Support for generating Yum configs was added in 1.2.0, and Apt configs was added in 1.3.0. Before that, you could use :ref:`server-plugins-generators-cfg-genshi` or :ref:`server-plugins-generators-cfg-cheetah` to generate your configs. .. _native-yum-libraries: Using Native Yum Libraries ========================== .. versionadded:: 1.2.0 By default, Bcfg2 uses an internal implementation of Yum's dependency resolution and other routines so that the Bcfg2 server can be run on a host that does not support Yum itself. If you run the Bcfg2 server on a machine that does have Yum libraries, however, you can enable use of those native libraries in Bcfg2 by setting ``use_yum_libraries`` to ``1`` in the ``[packages:yum]`` section of ``bcfg2.conf``. Benefits to this include: * Much lower memory usage by the ``bcfg2-server`` process. * Much faster ``Packages.Refresh`` behavior. * More accurate dependency resolution. * Better use of multiple processors/cores. Drawbacks include: * Resolution of package dependencies is slower and more resource-intensive. At times it can be much slower, particularly after running ``Packages.Refresh``. * More disk I/O. This can be alleviated by putting ``/var/lib/bcfg2/Packages/cache`` on tmpfs, but that offsets the lower memory usage. In some cases, you may have to raise the open file limit for the user who runs your Bcfg2 server process, particularly if you have a lot of repositories. Configuring the Yum Helper -------------------------- Due to poor memory management by the Yum API, the long-lived bcfg2-server process uses an external short-lived helper, ``bcfg2-yum-helper``, to do the actual Yum API calls for native yum library support. By default, Bcfg2 looks for this helper in ``$PATH``, or, failing that, at ``/usr/sbin/bcfg2-yum-helper``. If you have installed the helper elsewhere, you will need to configure that location with the ``helper`` option in the ``[packages:yum]`` section, e.g.:: [packages:yum] use_yum_libraries = 1 helper = /usr/local/sbin/bcfg2-yum-helper Setting Yum Options ------------------- In ``bcfg2.conf``, any options you set in the ``[packages:yum]`` section other than ``use_yum_libraries`` and ``helper`` will be passed along verbatim to the configuration of the Yum objects used in the Bcfg2 server. The following options are set by default, and should not generally be overridden: * ``cachedir`` is set to a hashed value unique to each distinct Yum configuration. Don't set this unless you know what you're doing. * ``keepcache`` is set to ``0``; there is no benefit to changing this. * ``sslverify`` is set to ``0``; change this if you know what you're doing. * ``reposdir`` is set to ``/dev/null`` to prevent the server's Yum configuration from being read; do not change this. Package Groups -------------- Yum package groups are supported by both the native Yum libraries and Bcfg2's internal dependency resolver. To include a package group, use the :xml:attribute:`PackageStructure:group` attribute of the :xml:element:`Package` tag. You can use either the short group ID or the long group name: .. code-block:: xml By default, only those packages considered the "default" packages in a group will be installed. You can change this behavior using the :xml:attribute:`PackageStructure:type` attribute: .. code-block:: xml Valid values of "type" are: * ``mandatory``: Only install mandatory packages in the group. * ``default``: Install default packages from the group (the default). * ``optional`` or ``all``: Install all packages in the group, including mandatory, default, and optional packages. See :xml:type:`PackageStructure` for details. You can view the packages in a group by category with the ``yum groupinfo`` command. More information about the different levels can be found at http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/How_to_use_and_edit_comps.xml_for_package_groups#Installation Abstract Package Tags --------------------- If you are using the native Yum libraries, the abstract Package tag supports several attributes in addition to the standard :xml:attribute:`PackageStructure:name`: .. xml:type:: PackageStructure .. _pulp-source-support: Pulp Support ============ .. versionadded:: 1.2.0 Bcfg2 contains explicit support for repositories managed by Pulp (http://pulpproject.org/). .. note:: Only the Pulp 1.x API is supported at this time. When the Pulp 2.x API is finalized support will be added for it. Due to the amount of data about a repository that can be retrieved directly from Pulp, the only thing necessary to configure a Pulp repo is the repo ID, in :xml:attribute:`SourceType:pulp_id`: .. code-block:: xml Pulp sources require some additional configuration. First, the Bcfg2 server must have a valid ``/etc/pulp/consumer/consumer.conf`` that is readable by the user your Bcfg2 server runs as; the Pulp server, URLs, and so on, are determined from this. Secondly, in ``bcfg2.conf`` you must set the following options in the ``[packages:pulp]`` section: * ``username`` and ``password``: The username and password of a Pulp user that will be used to register new clients and bind them to repositories. Membership in the default ``consumer-users`` role is sufficient. Bcfg2 clients using Pulp sources will be registered to the Pulp server as consumers, and will be bound to the appropriate repositories. Debugging unexpected behavior ============================= .. versionadded:: 1.2.1 Using bcfg2-info ---------------- The dependency resolver used in Packages can be run in debug mode:: $ bcfg2-info packageresolve foo.example.com bcfg2-server zlib ... 2 initial packages bcfg2-server zlib 54 new packages added sqlite less libxml2 expat ... 1 unknown packages libglib-2.0.so.0()(64bit) This will show why the resolver is acting as it is. Replace ``foo.example.com`` and ``bcfg2-server`` with a client name and list of packages, respectively. Note that resolving a partial package list (as above) may result in more unknown entries than you'd have otherwise; some of the package drivers (Yum in particular) consider the full package list when resolving multiple providers, and will not be able to properly resolve some dependencies without a full package list. You can also view the sources applicable to a client:: $ bcfg2-info packagesources foo.example.com ... Name: centos-6-x86_64-updates Type: yum URL: http://mirror.example.com/centos-6-x86_64-updates GPG Key(s): http://mirror.example.com/centos-6-x86_64-updates/RPM-GPG-KEY-CentOS-6 Name: centos-6-x86_64-os Type: yum URL: http://mirror.example.com/centos-6-x86_64-os GPG Key(s): http://mirror.example.com/centos-6-x86_64-os/RPM-GPG-KEY-CentOS-6 Using bcfg2-server ------------------ Once the server is started, enable debugging via bcfg2-admin:: $ bcfg2-admin xcmd Packages.toggle_debug TODO list ========= * Zypper support * Portage support .. _configuration: Configuration ============= ``bcfg2.conf`` contains miscellaneous configuration options for the Packages plugin. Any booleans in the config file accept the values "1", "yes", "true", and "on" for True, and "0", "no", "false", and "off" for False. For historical reasons, ``resolver`` and ``metadata`` also accept "enabled" and "disabled". It understands the following directives: [packages] section ------------------ +-------------+------------------------------------------------------+----------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Name | Description | Values | Default | +=============+======================================================+==========+===================================================================+ | resolver | Enable dependency resolution | Boolean | True | +-------------+------------------------------------------------------+----------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | metadata | Enable metadata processing. Disabling ``metadata`` | Boolean | True | | | implies disabling ``resolver`` as well. | | | +-------------+------------------------------------------------------+----------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | yum_config | The path at which to generate Yum configs. | String | /etc/yum.repos.d/bcfg2.repo | +-------------+------------------------------------------------------+----------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | apt_config | The path at which to generate APT configs. | String | /etc/apt/sources.list.d/bcfg2-packages-generated-sources.list | +-------------+------------------------------------------------------+----------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | gpg_keypath | The path on the client RPM GPG keys will be copied | String | /etc/pki/rpm-gpg | | | to before they are imported on the client. | | | +-------------+------------------------------------------------------+----------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | version | Set the version attribute used when binding Packages | any|auto | auto | +-------------+------------------------------------------------------+----------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+ | cache | Path where Packages will store its cache | String | /Packages/cache | +-------------+------------------------------------------------------+----------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+ [packages:yum] section ---------------------- +-------------------+----------------------------------------------------------+---------+-----------+ | Name | Description | Values | Default | +===================+==========================================================+=========+===========+ | use_yum_libraries | Whether or not to use the | Boolean | False | | | :ref:`native yum library support ` | | | +-------------------+----------------------------------------------------------+---------+-----------+ | helper | Path to ``bcfg2-yum-helper`` | String | See below | +-------------------+----------------------------------------------------------+---------+-----------+ To find ``bcfg2-yum-helper`` if none is specified, Bcfg2 looks first in ``$PATH`` and then in ``/usr/sbin/bcfg2-yum-helper`` for the helper. All other options in the ``[packages:yum]`` section will be passed along verbatim to the Yum configuration if you are using the native Yum library support. [packages:pulp] section ----------------------- +----------+-----------------------------------------------------+--------+---------+ | Name | Description | Values | Default | +==========+=====================================================+========+=========+ | username | The username of a Pulp user that will be used to | String | None | | | register new clients and bind them to repositories. | | | +----------+-----------------------------------------------------+--------+---------+ | password | The password of the Pulp user | String | None | +----------+-----------------------------------------------------+--------+---------+ The user should be a member of the default ``consumer-users`` role.