[openstack-dev] [oslo.config] Centralized config management

Flavio Percoco flavio at redhat.com
Fri Jan 10 10:34:30 UTC 2014


On 09/01/14 13:28 -0500, Jay Pipes wrote:
>On Thu, 2014-01-09 at 10:23 +0100, Flavio Percoco wrote:
>> On 08/01/14 17:13 -0800, Nachi Ueno wrote:
>> >Hi folks
>> >
>> >OpenStack process tend to have many config options, and many hosts.
>> >It is a pain to manage this tons of config options.
>> >To centralize this management helps operation.
>> >
>> >We can use chef or puppet kind of tools, however
>> >sometimes each process depends on the other processes configuration.
>> >For example, nova depends on neutron configuration etc
>> >
>> >My idea is to have config server in oslo.config, and let cfg.CONF get
>> >config from the server.
>> >This way has several benefits.
>> >
>> >- We can get centralized management without modification on each
>> >projects ( nova, neutron, etc)
>> >- We can provide horizon for configuration
>> >
>> >This is bp for this proposal.
>> >https://blueprints.launchpad.net/oslo/+spec/oslo-config-centralized
>> >
>> >I'm very appreciate any comments on this.
>>
>> I've thought about this as well. I like the overall idea of having a
>> config server. However, I don't like the idea of having it within
>> oslo.config. I'd prefer oslo.config to remain a library.
>>
>> Also, I think it would be more complex than just having a server that
>> provides the configs. It'll need authentication like all other
>> services in OpenStack and perhaps even support of encryption.
>>
>> I like the idea of a config registry but as mentioned above, IMHO it's
>> to live under its own project.
>
>Hi Nati and Flavio!
>
>So, I'm -1 on this idea, just because I think it belongs in the realm of
>configuration management tooling (Chef/Puppet/Salt/Ansible/etc). Those
>tools are built to manage multiple configuration files and changes in
>them. Adding a config server would dramatically change the way that
>configuration management tools would interface with OpenStack services.
>Instead of managing the config file templates as all of the tools
>currently do, the tools would need to essentially need to forego the
>tried-and-true INI files and instead write a bunch of code in order to
>deal with REST API set/get operations for changing configuration data.
>
>In summary, while I agree that OpenStack services have an absolute TON
>of configurability -- for good and bad -- there are ways to improve the
>usability of configuration without changing the paradigm that most
>configuration management tools expect. One such example is having
>include.d/ support -- similar to the existing oslo.cfg module's support
>for a --config-dir, but more flexible and more like what other open
>source programs (like Apache) have done for years.

FWIW, this is the exact reason why I didn't propose the idea. Although
I like the idea, I'm not fully convinced.

I don't want to reinvent existing configuration management tools, nor
tight OpenStack services to this server. In my head I thought about it
as an optional thing that could help deployments that are not already
using other tools but lets be realistic, who isn't using configuration
tools nowadays? It'd be very painful to manage the whole thing without
these tools.

Anyway, all this to say, I agree with you and that I think
implementing this service would be more complex than just serving
configurations. :)

Cheers,
FF

-- 
@flaper87
Flavio Percoco
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