Set Environment Variables with Puppet

Question

I am using vagrant with puppet to set up virtual machines for development environments. I would like to simply set a few environment variables in the .pp file. Using virtual box and a vagrant base box for Ubuntu 64 bit.

I have this currently.

$bar = 'bar'

class foobar {
   exec { 'foobar':
     command => "export Foo=${bar}",
   }
}

but when provisioning I get an error: Could not find command 'export'.

This seems like it should be simple enough am I missing some sort of require or path for the exec type? I noticed in the documentation there is an environment option to set up environment variables, should I be using that?

Solution 1

If you only need the variables available in the puppet run, whats wrong with :

Exec { environment => [ "foo=$bar" ] }

?

Solution 2

Simplest way to acomplish this is to put your env vars in /etc/environment, this ensures they are available to everything (or pretty much everything).

Something like this:

class example($somevar) {
    file { "/etc/environment":
        content => inline_template("SOMEVAR=${somevar}")
    }
}

Reason for having the class parameterised is so you can target it from hiera with automatic variable lookup (http://docs.puppetlabs.com/hiera/1/puppet.html#automatic-parameter-lookup) ... if you're sticking something in /etc/environment, it's usually best if you actually make it environment specific.

note: I've only tested this on ubuntu

Solution 3

You can set an environment variable by defining it on a line in /etc/environment and you can ensure a line inside a file using file_line in puppet. Combine these two into the following solution:

file_line { "foo_env_var":
    ensure  => present,
    line    => "Foo=${bar}",
    path    => "/etc/environment",
}

Solution 4

The way I got around it is to also use /etc/profile.d:

$bar = 'bar'
file { "/etc/profile.d/my_test.sh":
  content => "export Foo=${bar}",
  mode    => 755
}

This ensures that everytime you login (ex ssh), the variable $MYVAR gets exported to your environment. After you apply through puppet and login (ex ssh localhost), echo $Foo would return bar

Solution 5

You could try the following, which sets the environment variable for this exec:

class foobar {
   exec { 'foobar' :
     command => "/bin/bash -c \"export Foo=${bar}\"",
   }
}

View more solutions

Comments

[bgrantdev]

Thanks for the response I actually found that solution. While it removes the error about the command not being found it unfortunately does not produce the expected result. The environment variable Foo is not set when I ssh into the virtual machine.

[ptierno]

exec statements wont export the variable for when he logs in to the server.

[John]

I know that - thats why i said 'if you only need the variables available in the puppet run'. The question does not state that the variables are required to be set in user shells

[Felix Frank]

This is a noop. It modifies the environment of a shell that has been forked specifically for this exec resource. This shell then immediately terminates. The export has no effect.

[7yl4r]

I like the simple & succinct fix much more than I dislike that this pollutes my /etc/environment. Thanks.

[N. DaSilva]

This is the cleanest solution if you need to coexist with other environment variables in your /etc/environment file. You can also use the match parameter to ensure that the line isn't duplicated after it is changed.

[LanFeusT]

How would you use that variable? Just $foo_env_var ?

[7yl4r]

foo_env_var is the name of the line used by puppet only. The environment variable being set here is Foo so using it will be like $Foo - eg: echo $Foo