« Puppet 2.7.0 was recently released. This version, like every new Puppet release, brings numerous new features (and not counting bug fixes), including one I'm very proud of: Network Device Management.

The configuration system does roughly the following:

    connect to the device, through ssh or telnet
    authenticate as a user (possibly unprivileged in which case it can "enable")
    check the current device state
    apply the necessary changes as IOS commands to bring it to the correct state

To achieve this, Puppet 2.7.0 introduces a new Puppet application called 'puppet device'. This application will run on a Puppet node (multiple puppet device can run on different hosts) and will make sure a given list of network devices will be managed.

This application acts as a smart proxy between the Puppet Master and the managed network device. To do this, puppet device will sequentially connects to the master on behalf of the managed network device and will ask for a catalog (a catalog containing only network device resources). It will then apply this catalog to the said device by translating the resources to orders the network device understands. Puppet device will then report back to the master for any changes and failures as a standard node. »