I was lucky enough to head over to Berlin last week for Velocity EU where there was a long discussion about using yum / rpms for configuration management, deployment, the whole cycle. Aside an informal chat with the Etsy guys about some new chef features we’re both interested in, I didn’t hear anything else in the way of config. management. This was my first Velocity (awesome by the way!) so I might have had the wrong expectations but I’m left wondering whether a) are a lot of people using chef in web ops in Europe, b) are there just no new ‘cool’ WebOps specific CF tricks these days (answer - no or c) everyone’s got it all down pat they’d rather talk about more WebOps specific stuff.
I feel like the answer should be c - but then there was a session about using yum for the whole cycle, so I’m not so sure…
I also wore the #opscode t-shirt, hoping it would attract some like minded folk, but that seemed to fail
Cheers,
Ant
Anthony Goddard
Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboratory
On Nov 16, 2011, at 7:36 AM, Anthony Goddard wrote:
I was lucky enough to head over to Berlin last week for Velocity EU where there was a long discussion about using yum / rpms for configuration management, deployment, the whole cycle. Aside an informal chat with the Etsy guys about some new chef features we're both interested in, I didn't hear anything else in the way of config. management. This was my first Velocity (awesome by the way!) so I might have had the wrong expectations but I'm left wondering whether a) are a lot of people using chef in web ops in Europe, b) are there just no new 'cool' WebOps specific CF tricks these days (answer - no or c) everyone's got it all down pat they'd rather talk about more WebOps specific stuff.
I used to live and work in Europe, and I still have a number of friends over there, so maybe I can speak to this issue a bit.
First off, Chef, Puppet, and cfengine are all tools that were developed in the US, and I think their development overseas has been a bit slower. Sure, Mark Burgess has worked at the University in Oslo for years, but he's not a native European. There is Chef and Puppet adoption over there, but not yet to the degree we have here in the US.
That isn't to say that folks over in Europe aren't some of the smartest people in the world, it's just that a lot of cool early technologies and tools tend to travel by word of mouth, and will generally tend to be more geographically localized during the early phases.
There is a Puppet conference scheduled for some time in March 2012 somewhere over there in Europe, and there are well-known members of the Chef community who live and work over there (including Stephen Nelson-Smith, author of the O'Reilly book "Test-Driven Infrastructure with Chef: Bring behaviour-driven development to infrastructure as code"), just that there aren't as many members of the Chef community over there and I don't know if there are any Opscode employees over there.
Heck, the Chef community is just about to have our own first industry "un-conference" in Seattle, so it's not surprising that our adoption overseas would be a bit slower.
As for alternatives to cfengine, Puppet, or Chef, I'm not sure I've got any answers for you. I can tell you that DevOps is still a new enough concept and I think we're a small enough community that it wouldn't surprise me that there are relatively few new tools in this space at any one point in time, at least when it comes to big paradigm shifts.
On the other hand, people are amazingly inventive and I am constantly finding out about new tools that I should have already known about, but didn't. So maybe that's just my fault for being dense.
Anyway, I know that some of the people on Chef Infra (archive) are from overseas, so maybe you could come on irc and ask them yourself?
Would love to meet other enthusiasts if anyone is interested in a meetup.
On Wed, Nov 16, 2011 at 2:36 PM, Anthony Goddard agoddard@mbl.edu wrote:
I was lucky enough to head over to Berlin last week for Velocity EU where
there was a long discussion about using yum / rpms for configuration
management, deployment, the whole cycle. Aside an informal chat with the
Etsy guys about some new chef features we're both interested in, I didn't
hear anything else in the way of config. management. This was my first
Velocity (awesome by the way!) so I might have had the wrong expectations
but I'm left wondering whether a) are a lot of people using chef in web ops
in Europe, b) are there just no new 'cool' WebOps specific CF tricks these
days (answer - no or c) everyone's got it all down pat they'd rather
talk about more WebOps specific stuff.
I feel like the answer should be c - but then there was a session about
using yum for the whole cycle, so I'm not so sure..
I also wore the #opscode t-shirt, hoping it would attract some like minded
folk, but that seemed to fail
Cheers,
Ant
Anthony Goddard
Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboratory
Would love to meet other enthusiasts if anyone is interested in a meetup.
On Wed, Nov 16, 2011 at 2:36 PM, Anthony Goddard agoddard@mbl.edu wrote:
I was lucky enough to head over to Berlin last week for Velocity EU where
there was a long discussion about using yum / rpms for configuration
management, deployment, the whole cycle. Aside an informal chat with the
Etsy guys about some new chef features we're both interested in, I didn't
hear anything else in the way of config. management. This was my first
Velocity (awesome by the way!) so I might have had the wrong expectations
but I'm left wondering whether a) are a lot of people using chef in web ops
in Europe, b) are there just no new 'cool' WebOps specific CF tricks these
days (answer - no or c) everyone's got it all down pat they'd rather talk
about more WebOps specific stuff.
I feel like the answer should be c - but then there was a session about
using yum for the whole cycle, so I'm not so sure..
I also wore the #opscode t-shirt, hoping it would attract some like minded
folk, but that seemed to fail
Cheers,
Ant
Anthony Goddard
Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboratory
Would love to meet other enthusiasts if anyone is interested in a meetup.
On Wed, Nov 16, 2011 at 2:36 PM, Anthony Goddard agoddard@mbl.edu wrote:
I was lucky enough to head over to Berlin last week for Velocity EU where
there was a long discussion about using yum / rpms for configuration
management, deployment, the whole cycle. Aside an informal chat with the
Etsy guys about some new chef features we're both interested in, I didn't
hear anything else in the way of config. management. This was my first
Velocity (awesome by the way!) so I might have had the wrong expectations
but I'm left wondering whether a) are a lot of people using chef in web ops
in Europe, b) are there just no new 'cool' WebOps specific CF tricks these
days (answer - no or c) everyone's got it all down pat they'd rather talk
about more WebOps specific stuff.
I feel like the answer should be c - but then there was a session about
using yum for the whole cycle, so I'm not so sure..
I also wore the #opscode t-shirt, hoping it would attract some like minded
folk, but that seemed to fail
Cheers,
Ant
Anthony Goddard
Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboratory
or c) everyone’s got it all down pat they’d rather talk about more WebOps specific stuff.
or c) everyone's got it all down pat they'd rather talk about more WebOps specific stuff.