Debian Cookbook

Table of Contents

• Description
• Requirements
• Recipes
• Attributes
• Resources and Providers
• Usage
• License and Author

Description

Chef cookbook for managing Apt sources for official Debian repositories.

This cookbook can be used to configure the whole system for all the wanted
sources (stable, security, stable-updates, etc.). Just including the "default"
recipe to the run list gives a sensible default.

Individual recipes can also be used by other cookbooks that need packages for
example from the backports repository.

Requirements

Intended for use in Debian, but could be modified for other Apt based platforms.
Tested on Debian 6.0 Squeeze and Debian 7.0 Wheezy.

Requires apt community cookbook.

Recipes

The default recipe configures /etc/apt/sources.list using the mirror and
components specified by node attributes. It also includes other recipes if
specified via node attributes.

The other recipes configure apt to use the corresponding Debian repository:

• backports - Sets up apt source for Debian Backports repository.
• backports_sloppy - Sets up apt source for Debian Backports/sloppy repository. Only supported on Squeeze. Also includes the backports recipe.
• security - Sets up apt source for Debian Security Updates repository.
• sid - Alias for unstable recipe.
• stable_proposed_updates - Sets up apt source for Debian stable-proposed-updates repository and includes stable_updates recipe.
• stable_updates - Sets up apt source for Debian stable-updates repository.
• testing - Sets up apt source for Debian "testing" repository with pin priority 50.
• unstable - Sets up apt source for Debian "unstable" repository with pin priority 40.

Attributes

The following attributes specify if the corresponding recipe/repository is
included by the default recipe:

Resources and Providers

debian_repository

Sets up Debian repository and optionally pinning preferences using
apt_repository LWRP. This is used internally by the recipes, but feel free
if you find usage for it in your own cookbooks.

Attribute parameters:

• repo_name - Name_attribute. The name of the repository and configuration files.
• uri - The base URI of the repository. Defaults to node['debian']['mirror'].
• distribution - Name attribute. The distribution part of apt source line.
• components - The components part of apt source line. Defaults to node['debian']['components'].
• deb_src - If true, enables apt source line too. Defaults to node['debian']['deb_src'].
• pin_priority - The default pinning priority for the repository. Defaults to nil which means that no preferences are set.

Example:

# feel the history
debian_repository "woody" do
  uri "http://archive.debian.org/debian"
  pin_priority 200
end

Usage

If you want to manage /etc/apt/souces.list with Chef, add the default recipe
to the run list, preferably as the first one. The default recipe also includes
"apt::default" recipe, so you don't need to add it.

Then you can also specify which additional repositories are configured by
setting node['debian']['<repo>'] attributes to true or false. By default
a standard set is included. The other option is to add the wanted repositories
(e.g. recipe[debian::backports]) directly to the run list.

The default base URI (http.debian.net) should be fine for most cases as it
redirects to a geographically closest mirror. You can also to set it explicitly
for example in a role:

default_attributes(
  :debian => {
    :mirror => "http://ftp.fi.debian.org/debian"
  }
)

Other cookbooks that need packages from a specific repository should depend on
this cookbook, include the corresponding repository recipe and possibly add
apt-pinning rules for the packages as needed. Example:

# configure backports.debian.org
include_recipe "debian::backports"

# set apt-pinning rules
%w[thepackage and some dependencies].each do |pkg|
  apt_preference pkg do
    pin "release o=Debian Backports"
    pin_priority "700"
  end
end

# install the package
package "thepackage"

License and Author

Author:: Teemu Matilainen <teemu.matilainen@reaktor.fi>

Copyright © 2011-2013, Reaktor Innovations Oy

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0. See [LICENSE](LICENSE).