Upgrading Multiple Servers?

Kenneth E. Lussier klussier at sentito.com
Mon May 10 09:28:00 EDT 2004


On Sun, 2004-05-09 at 21:16, Kurth Bemis wrote:
> We have several servers, (OK lots of servers) that we use for hosting 
> websites, mail servers, firewalls, and billing and provisioning.
> 
> It's a real pain to ssh to each of the boxen and repeat the same process 
> again and again to upgrade apache,php,mod_perl,mod_ssl, system files, etc.
> 
> I'm wondering if anyone knows of a tool that will allow me to create one 
> "master" machine or image that can then be duplicated to the other 
> machines, so that all the machines are exact copies of each other.
> 
> The config and users files are on separate partitions then the binaries 
> so that's not an issue.
> 
> The solution needs to scalable, as we are adding machines every other 
> week it seems.

I can't remember the name of the software, and I'm not even sure that it
is available anymore, but VA Software, back when they were VA Linux had
a deployment system for just this purpose. You built a "Golden System"
and a "Golden Server". The Golden System was built out exactly the way
you wanted it. The golden server ran VA's software, and it monitored the
golden system for changes. On all of the other machines, you installed a
small agent. If the golden system changed, then the golden server would
send out the information to all of the agents and update them. You could
also put a new box on the network and it would install itself from the
golden server. It was meant for rapid deployment in changing
environments. 

Any of the VA Software people out there remember this software?

C-Ya,
Kenny  
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