Propellor is a configuration management system using Haskell and Git. Each system has a list of properties, which Propellor ensures are satisfied. Linux and FreeBSD are supported.

Propellor is configured via a git repository, which typically lives in ~/.propellor/ on your development machine. Propellor clones the repository to each host it manages, in a secure way. See components for details.

Properties are defined using Haskell in the file ~/.propellor/config.hs. There is fairly complete API documentation, which includes many built-in Properties for dealing with Apt and Apache, Cron and Commands, Dns and Docker, etc.

There is no special language as used in puppet, ansible, etc.. just the full power of Haskell. Hopefully that power can be put to good use in making declarative properties that are powerful, nicely idempotent, and easy to adapt to a system's special needs!

If using Haskell to configure Propellor seems intimidating, see configuration for the Haskell newbie.

quick start

  1. Get propellor installed on your development machine (ie, laptop). apt-get install propellor or cabal install propellor or cabal unpack propellor; cd propellor-version; stack install
  2. Run propellor --init ; this will set up a ~/.propellor/ git repository for you.
  3. Edit ~/.propellor/config.hs, and add a host you want to manage. You can start by not adding any properties, or only a few.
  4. Run: propellor --spin $HOST
  5. Now you have a simple propellor deployment to a host. Continue editing ~/.propellor/config.hs to further configure the host, add more hosts etc, and re-run propellor --spin $HOST after each change.
  6. Once you have a lot of hosts, and running propellor --spin HOST for each host becomes tiresome, you can automate that.
  7. Write some neat new properties and send patches!

(Want to get your feet wet with propellor before plunging in? try this)

news

version 5.17
Posted Sat Jun 10 13:49:48 2023
version 5.16
Posted Mon May 29 15:26:38 2023
version 5.15
Posted Tue Nov 15 19:35:21 2022
version 5.14.1
Posted Sat Oct 15 18:44:19 2022
version 5.14
Posted Sat Oct 15 18:44:13 2022
propellor demo
Posted Mon Sep 15 18:49:16 2014

enjoy

Hope you find Propellor fun and useful!

Propellor is free software, licensed under the BSD license.

You are encouraged to send patches and improve it.
See contributing.

posts

custom type checker errors for propellor
Posted Tue Jul 2 20:53:16 2019 by joey
custom ARM disk image generation with propellor
Posted Sun Nov 19 19:51:22 2017 by joey
Functional Reactive Propellor
Posted Sat Jul 15 21:43:21 2017 by joey
Linux.Conf.Au 2017 presentation on Propellor
Posted Wed Nov 16 15:13:32 2016 by joey
type safe multi-OS Propellor
Posted Mon Mar 28 11:29:18 2016 by joey
letsencrypt support in propellor
Posted Sun Feb 7 22:10:20 2016 by joey
propelling disk images
Posted Fri Oct 23 02:09:17 2015 by joey
propellor orchestration
Posted Thu Oct 22 01:02:58 2015 by joey
then and now
Posted Thu Aug 27 00:01:59 2015 by joey
making propellor safer with GADTs and type families
Posted Sun Jan 25 03:54:14 2015 by joey
clean OS reinstalls with propellor
Posted Fri Dec 5 20:24:32 2014 by joey
propelling containers
Posted Fri Nov 21 21:33:06 2014 by joey
propellor is d-i 2.0
Posted Mon Sep 8 09:32:25 2014 by joey
how I wrote init by accident
Posted Wed May 14 15:05:49 2014 by joey
propellor-driven DNS and backups
Posted Sat Apr 19 07:08:45 2014 by joey
propellor introspection for DNS
Posted Fri Apr 11 05:05:54 2014 by joey
propellor type-safe reversions
Posted Wed Apr 2 17:09:02 2014 by joey
adding docker support to propellor
Posted Tue Apr 1 08:22:41 2014 by joey
introducing propellor
Posted Sun Mar 30 07:50:42 2014 by joey
                      --     _         ______`|                          ,-.__ 
 {- Propellor          --  /   \___-=O`/|O`/__|                         (____.'
    Deployed -}         -- \          / | /    )             _.-"-._
                        --  `/-==__ _/__|/__=-|             (       \_
hosts :: [Host]        --   *             \ | |              '--------'
hosts =               --                  (o)  `