FOG 1.3 persistent groups

[Sebastian Roth]

@george1421 I am sorry but I still don’t actually get what you want to achieve with “persistent groups”… Do you mean kind of “persistent settings throughout a group”?

[JJ Fullmer]

@Sebastian-Roth
Ok let me try to explain at least my idea in a simpler way. I tend to use too many words.

So lets say you have a department like accounting. This department all needs access to the same printers, software, and needs to be in the same OU.
I want to be able to add a host to the accounting group that already has all those settings saved.
So when I add a host to the accounting group I can then apply all the saved printers, OU settings, snapins, and image with a single action.

Does that make sense?

I think @george1421’s desires are a little more complex then mind, but a similar idea.

[Wayne Workman]

@george1421 said:

We can script it - I’m confident we can.

[george1421]

WARNING: I’ll always use to many words

In my case, lets say I have 3 classes of computers. Each class has their own image and OU location.

1. Workstations. They are members of the <Site OU> SOE Workstation group. They have image Win7X64, and shall be placed in the “ou=Workstation,ou=<site code>,dc=domain,dc=com” OU
2. Design Stations. They are members of the <Site OU> SOE Designstation group. They have image Win7X64DS, and shall be placed in the “ou=Designstation,ou=<site code>,dc=domain,dc=com” OU
3. Lab equipment. They are members of the <Site OU> Lab Equipment group. They have image Win7X86Lab, and shall be placed in the “ou=Lab,ou=<site code>,dc=domain,dc=com” OU

This all works good with the groups. But I must first register the name of the system, pick its group association. Then go into the group function and add those proper settings to all hosts in that group.

What I need is a host template somewhere, so when I add that new computer and select its group all of the attributes associated with that group will be applied to that new device. i.e. By having the group values persistently saved some place.

[Wayne Workman]

@george1421 I’m a new-comer to PHP and web development. I’ve done some cool stuff with it so far - it’s really powerful. but FOG’s plugin system remains a mystery to me.

That said, I can 100% positively create a template in the DB, and create a back-end process that enforces this template. I just don’t know how to integrate it into the fog web-gui.

[george1421]

@Wayne-Workman While I haven’t started doing anything yet (waiting for some sanity), I think I’m pretty close with the existing infrastructure. That sql trigger will do all of the dirty work. I’ve coded in sql for about 20 years. Unless mysql is really “out there” that part shouldn’t be that difficult (mssql and oracle can do this, no problem).

[Wayne Workman]

@george1421 Well then… Sounds like your approach is far superior. If you can handle this in the DB alone somehow, go for it man. I will always opt for a smaller technology stack than a larger one to get something done.

Just fill in the rest of us wondering how it works

[george1421]

I didn’t forget about this project (hack), I’ve been tied up with a few commitments for the last few days so I haven’t been able to push to far. I’m going to post what I have so far (just the concept) so I don’t forget what has been done so far.

I’ve looked into how I can best augment what is in place to allow some kind of persistence so newly added hosts will be updated with the values I’ve defined in the host template.

I’ve looked through the db structure for FOG and identified several tables that could help me in my quest. These tables are (hosts, groupMembers, printerAssoc, snapinAssoc, moduleStatusByHost). My approach will a specific database event that is triggered when a record is added to the groupMembers table. This trigger will fire after a new record is added to this table. The trigger will check to see if the group which is associated to the host, has a matching template (also stored in the hosts table). The trigger will attempt to find a hostname that matches the group name (exactly). If it finds this template, it will copy the contents of certain fields from the template record to the host record. After that update is done it will copy the snapins, printers, and modules from the matching host template to the host. In theory this “should work”. If a new group association is added and there is no matching host template then nothing is updated. The only down side I can see with this approach is if you have an established host with custom settings and you assign that host to a group where there is an associated host template, existing values will be overwritten with template values.

[george1421]

Here is the sql script as I have it so far. It does work as advertised. Right now I’m doing additional testing on my dev FOG server before its put on the production server. This trigger will fire when a new host is associated with a group and there is a host with the same exact name as the group name.

DELIMITER $$

CREATE TRIGGER new_groupmember_added 
AFTER INSERT ON `groupMembers` 
FOR EACH ROW
BEGIN

 SET @myHostID = NEW.gmHostID;
 SET @myGroupID = NEW.gmGroupID;

 SET @myTemplateID = (SELECT hostID FROM groups INNER JOIN hosts ON (groupName = hostName) WHERE groupID=@myGroupID);

 IF (@myTemplateID IS NOT NULL) AND (@myHostID <> @myTemplateID) THEN
   UPDATE hosts d, (SELECT hostImage, hostBuilding, hostUseAD, hostADDomain, hostADOU, 
   hostADUser, hostADPass, hostADPassLegacy, hostProductKey, hostPrinterLevel, hostKernelArgs, 
   hostExitBios, hostExitEfi FROM hosts WHERE hostID=@myTemplateID) s
   SET d.hostImage=s.hostImage, d.hostBuilding=s.hostBuilding, d.hostUseAD=s.hostUseAD, d.hostADDomain=s.hostADDomain,
   d.hostADOU=s.hostADOU, d.hostADUser=s.hostADUser, d.hostADPass=s.hostADPass, d.hostADPassLegacy=s.hostADPassLegacy,
   d.hostProductKey=s.hostProductKey, d.hostPrinterLevel=s.hostPrinterLevel, d.hostKernelArgs=s.hostKernelArgs,
   d.hostExitBios=s.hostExitBios, d.hostExitEfi=s.hostExitEfi
   WHERE d.hostID=@myHostID;

   INSERT INTO locationAssoc(laHostID,laLocationID)
   SELECT @myHostID as laHostID,laLocationID
   FROM locationAssoc WHERE laHostID=@myTemplateID;

   INSERT INTO printerAssoc(paHostID,paPrinterID,paIsDefault,paAnon1,paAnon2,paAnon3,paAnon4)
   SELECT @myHostID as paHostID,paPrinterID,paIsDefault,paAnon1,paAnon2,paAnon3,paAnon4
   FROM printerAssoc WHERE paHostID=@myTemplateID;

   INSERT INTO snapinAssoc(saHostID,saSnapinID)
   SELECT @myHostID as saHostID,saSnapinID 
   FROM snapinAssoc WHERE saHostID=@myTemplateID;

   INSERT INTO moduleStatusByHost(msHostID,msModuleID,msState)
   SELECT @myHostID as msHostID,msModuleID,msState
   FROM moduleStatusByHost WHERE msHostID=@myTemplateID;

 END IF;

END;
$$

DELIMITER ;

[Wayne Workman]

@george1421 That’s pretty sweet looking. I didn’t know about triggers till this thread, actually.

[george1421]

@george1421 Well after fine tuning the sql query for the trigger I tested it on my dev box this morning. It worked exactly as advertised. When you associate a device with a group name, where there is a host (template) with the same exact name, the contents of the host (template) will be copied to the device that was just associated with that group. If you associate a host with a group that has no matching host (template) nothing is changed for that associated host.

There were a few caveats that I found, more like rules than caveats.

1. Your group name must conform to the rules set out for hosts. In that your Group name may not contain spaces or more than 15 characters. The edit box for the host restricts these the group name does not.
2. For every host template you must define a unique mac address, duplicates are not allowed. So for my first host template I entered 00:00:00:00:00:01 and for the second 00:00:00:00:00:02 and so on.
3. When you make a host group association all of the fields (even empty ones) will be cloned to the associated host. All existing setting will be overwritten on the association.
4. After you have made the host group association, if you make a change to the host template those new settings are not updated on all hosts associated what that group (but you can still do this via the normal group update function)
5. Do NOT make the host template a member of the group you are trying to make persistent. I could see a loop being created by the trigger trying to reference a template that it is currently trying to update.

While I say this works, I have not attempted this (hack) on our production server just yet. I feel confident that it will work without issue. Since we are not making group associations every day (as you would if you added new hosts every day) I don’t see any performance issues.

[george1421]

Final thoughts.

While this is a hack(ish) solution. The proper solution is for the FOG management GUI to support this directly. If the developers wanted to use the same concept of just using a host as a template. I would probably do it this way.

1. Add a check box to the host configuration page and call it ?? “Make this a host a template”
2. Once the host is a template it should no longer be displayed in the list of hosts but in a new list of templates.
3. For the groups, make a new drop down list called “host template” and only show hosts where the template flag is set.
4. Then in the php code do the actions of the trigger after a host association.
5. Then you could key off if the host template was updated, ask the user if the fog application should update all hosts associated with this template.

[Sebastian Roth]

Great work George!

[Wayne Workman]

@george1421 said:

Do NOT make the host template a member of the group you are trying to make persistent. I could see a loop being created by the trigger trying to reference a template that it is currently trying to update.

Any way to add rules so it doesn’t apply if the template is a member of the group?

Or…

Should we force the template to be a member of the group and just disallow settings applying to the template… ???

[george1421]

@Wayne-Workman said:

Any way to add rules so it doesn’t apply if the template is a member of the group?

Or…

Should we force the template to be a member of the group and just disallow settings applying to the template… ???

Thinking about it, we probably could update the check for a null template id to also ensure the @myTemplateID variable does not match the @myHostID. If it does then not execute the update. [edit] wow there was to many double negatives in that statement. I should say its possible if we update the conditional if check[/edit] That should do it.

[george1421]

While this trigger is not supported by the developers, Tom did look at it and updated it so the fields were escaped properly.

DELIMITER $$

CREATE TRIGGER `new_groupmember_added` 
AFTER INSERT ON `groupMembers` 
FOR EACH ROW
BEGIN

 SET @myHostID = `NEW`.`gmHostID`;
 SET @myGroupID = `NEW`.`gmGroupID`;

 SET @myTemplateID = (SELECT `hostID` FROM `groups` INNER JOIN `hosts` ON (`groupName` = `hostName`) WHERE `groupID`=@myGroupID);

 IF (@myTemplateID IS NOT NULL) AND (@myHostID <> @myTemplateID) THEN
   UPDATE `hosts` `d`, (SELECT `hostImage`, `hostBuilding`, `hostUseAD`, `hostADDomain`, `hostADOU`, 
   `hostADUser`, `hostADPass`, `hostADPassLegacy`, `hostProductKey`, `hostPrinterLevel`, `hostKernelArgs`, 
   `hostExitBios`, `hostExitEfi`, `hostEnforce` FROM `hosts` WHERE `hostID`=@myTemplateID) `s`
   SET `d`.`hostImage`=`s`.`hostImage`, `d`.`hostBuilding`=`s`.`hostBuilding`, `d`.`hostUseAD`=`s`.`hostUseAD`, `d`.`hostADDomain`=`s`.`hostADDomain`,
   `d`.`hostADOU`=`s`.`hostADOU`, `d`.`hostADUser`=`s`.`hostADUser`, `d`.`hostADPass`=`s`.`hostADPass`, `d`.`hostADPassLegacy`=`s`.`hostADPassLegacy`,
   `d`.`hostProductKey`=`s`.`hostProductKey`, `d`.`hostPrinterLevel`=`s`.`hostPrinterLevel`, `d`.`hostKernelArgs`=`s`.`hostKernelArgs`,
   `d`.`hostExitBios`=`s`.`hostExitBios`, `d`.`hostExitEfi`=`s`.`hostExitEfi`, `d`.`hostEnforce`=`s`.`hostEnforce`
   WHERE `d`.`hostID`=@myHostID;

   INSERT INTO `locationAssoc` (`laHostID`,`laLocationID`)
   SELECT @myHostID as `laHostID`,`laLocationID`
   FROM `locationAssoc` WHERE `laHostID`=@myTemplateID;

   INSERT INTO `printerAssoc` (`paHostID`,`paPrinterID`,`paIsDefault`,`paAnon1`,`paAnon2`,`paAnon3`,`paAnon4`)
   SELECT @myHostID as `paHostID`,`paPrinterID`,`paIsDefault`,`paAnon1`,`paAnon2`,`paAnon3`,`paAnon4`
   FROM `printerAssoc` WHERE `paHostID`=@myTemplateID;

   INSERT INTO `snapinAssoc` (`saHostID`,`saSnapinID`)
   SELECT @myHostID as `saHostID`,`saSnapinID` 
   FROM `snapinAssoc` WHERE `saHostID`=@myTemplateID;

   INSERT INTO `moduleStatusByHost` (`msHostID`,`msModuleID`,`msState`)
   SELECT @myHostID as `msHostID`,`msModuleID`,`msState`
   FROM `moduleStatusByHost` WHERE `msHostID`=@myTemplateID;

 END IF;

END;
$$

DELIMITER ;

[JJ Fullmer]

@george1421 So if I understand this correctly, If I go login to mysql and select/use the fog database, then copy paste that nifty script. I will have hackish persistent groups and be able to make templates?

[george1421]

@JJ-Fullmer That is the idea/plan. You must name your persistent group the same exact name as the ‘fake’ host you will create. The reason why I said it this way, the group names have much more flexibility than the host names. Your group name must be consistent with host naming conventions.

This script creates a database trigger when you add a host to the persistent group. Just be aware if it is a setting the persistent group manages, it will be overwritten by the value in the persistent group. Meaning if you manually set a certain parameter for a host and then assign that host to a persistent group, the value in the persistent group wins and overwrites the value you manually added to the group. You can manually change the value post group assignment but not before. (I kind of lost myself in that explanation).

The key is only on group assignment is when the value are copied from the persistent host template.

As for the application of this script you probably need this following

1. Log into the mysql server on your fog server as root using mysql -u root
2. Then switch to the fog database (because that is where the trigger is needd) use fog;
3. Then paste the script into the mysql console (you may have to it enter on the end of the paste to get it to take).

That should be it. Now just create your host template and create your persistent group naming them exactly the same (case and everything). Then take a host and assign it to persistent group.

[JJ Fullmer]

@george1421 Well this may just work perfectly for me. Since each of my groups shares a common abbreviation at the start of their hostname related to their group. I am excited to play with this.

[JJ Fullmer]

To uninstall/disable the feature…Obviously only would be used when updating the trigger

drop trigger new_groupmember_added;