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Complete Mongrel Setup For Debian

this is a quick how-to for setting up mongrel with apache and puppet

We assume that you already installed puppet and apache2

  • Setup mongrel

N.B: puppetmaster 2.6 and newer knows how to work with mongrel starting multiple puppet instances. So we won’t have to install mongrel-cluster

sudo apt-get install mongrel
  • Enable some apache modules
sudo a2enmod headers proxy proxy_http proxy_balancer ssl

reload apache2

sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 reload
  • Edit the puppetmaster default file
sudo vi /etc/default/puppetmaster

#tell puppet to use mongrel
SERVERTYPE=mongrel

# How many puppetmaster instances to start? 
PUPPETMASTERS=100

# What port should the puppetmaster listen on.
# NOTE: if you are using mongrel, then you will need to have a
# front-end web-proxy (such as apache, nginx, pound) that takes
# incoming requests on the port your clients are connecting to
# (default is: 8140), and then passes them off to the mongrel
# processes.  In this case it is recommended to run your web-proxy on
# port 8140 and change the below number to something else, such as
# 18140.
PORT=18140

in my case, i use 100 instances of puppetmaster listening, but you’re not compel to, it will depend on your architecture and the number of nodes.

restart the puppetmaster

sudo /etc/init.d/puppetmaster restart

list your processes

ps -ef | grep puppet

/usr/bin/ruby1.8 /usr/bin/puppet master --servertype=mongrel --masterport=18140 --pidfile=/var/run/puppet/master-18140.pid
/usr/bin/puppet master --servertype=mongrel --masterport=18141 --pidfile=/var/run/puppet/master-18141.pid
/usr/bin/puppet master --servertype=mongrel --masterport=18142 --pidfile=/var/run/puppet/master-18142.pid
/usr/bin/puppet master --servertype=mongrel --masterport=18143 --pidfile=/var/run/puppet/master-18143.pid
  • create a virtualhost

this virtual host was adapted from puppet documentation

sudo vi /etc/apache2/sites-available/puppetmaster

Listen 8140

ProxyRequests Off
ProxyBadHeader Ignore



        BalancerMember http://127.0.0.1:18140



        SSLEngine On
        SSLCipherSuite SSLv2:-LOW:-EXPORT:RC4+RSA
        SSLCertificateFile /var/lib/puppet/ssl/certs/puppethost.domain.name.pem
        SSLCertificateKeyFile /var/lib/puppet/ssl/private_keys/puppethost.domain.name.pem
        SSLCertificateChainFile /var/lib/puppet/ssl/ca/ca_crt.pem
        SSLCACertificateFile /var/lib/puppet/ssl/ca/ca_crt.pem
        SSLCARevocationFile /var/lib/puppet/ssl/ca/ca_crl.pem

        SSLVerifyClient optional
        SSLVerifyDepth 1
        SSLOptions +StdEnvVars

        RequestHeader set X-SSL-Subject %{SSL_CLIENT_S_DN}e
        RequestHeader set X-Client-DN %{SSL_CLIENT_S_DN}e
        RequestHeader set X-Client-Verify %{SSL_CLIENT_VERIFY}e

        
                SetHandler balancer-manager
                Order allow,deny
                Allow from all
        

        ProxyPass / balancer://puppetmaster/
        ProxyPassReverse / balancer://puppetmaster/
        ProxyPreserveHost On

        ErrorLog /var/log/apache2/error.log
        CustomLog /var/log/apache2/access.log combined
        CustomLog /var/log/apache2/balancer_ssl_requests.log "%t %h %{SSL_PROTOCOL}x %{SSL_CIPHER}x \"%r\" %b"

replace puppethost.domain.name with your hostname

reload apache2

sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 reload

you should now be able to rum puppet client on a node and get your modifications applies or your packages installed

NB: on some architecture you’ll have to modify /etc/apache2/apache.conf to tune mpm_worker_module

hope this will help waiting for your comments