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Review: Puppet Vs. Chef Vs. Ansible Vs. Salt
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Paul Venezia provides an in-depth review of Puppet, Chef, Ansible, and Salt — four leading configuration management and orchestration tools, each of which takes a different path to server automation. 'Puppet, Chef, Ansible, and Salt were all built with that very goal in mind: to make it much easier to configure and maintain dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of servers. That's not to say that smaller shops won't benefit from these tools, as automation and orchestration generally make life easier in an infrastructure of any size. I looked at each of these four tools in depth, explored their design and function, and determined that, while some scored higher than others, there's a place for each to fit in, depending on the goals of the deployment. Here, I summarize my findings.'"
"That's not to say that smaller shops won't benefit from these tools"
I call BS on that statement, I run puppet at home for my 2.5 servers, it really simplifies my life.
I prefer Puppet, but I don't think it's perfect. As a result, I've written some complicated hacks do to complicated things that aren't directly possible in core. I still think Puppet is the closest thing to being right.
Feel free to look through my articles and hacks: https://ttboj.wordpress.com/
Most code available at: https://github.com/purpleidea/
Am I the only one who saw Ansible in the article and was expecting a discussion about FTL communications?
I chose Ansible because it goes in line with my minimalist configuration policy, it works via ssh and doesnt need an agent. Puppet or Chef are very interesting, but use a lot of resources.
imagine a room full of angry hitmen.
Puppet: plans to beat you to death, but when his arm gets tired he cant switch to the other arm. instead he grabs a box of markers and proceeds to write an angry letter on your face.
Chef: is competent enough to kill you in your sleep, knows everything about you and can even draft random passerby for practice. Shes spending the next 2 months assembling a rifle for each possible scenario she may find you in, and redefining some of the most effective murder/homicides in history so they work just for you.
Ansible: A nice killer in a business suit that will probably smother you and dispose of your corpse in an entirely predictable way. The 'Murder She Wrote' of configuration management, she'll win an oscar once you're dead.
Salt:as of this writing, salt last killed 54 days ago and currently stands as the less-than-well-known of your potential murderers. Salt has pretty good ideas on how you should die...its just puppet has been maiming folks for way longer and chef's gotten so popular that people cant walk through the streets without hearing someone gloat about how wonderfully she kills. Salt has a manifesto and a pretty sizeable arsenal...someone just needs to send a contract over, or a phonecall, or whatever it is chef does when she gets to murder folks.
Good people go to bed earlier.