Python for the sys admin

Note

I wonder how much of this has been subsumed by Fabric and the advent of Chef/Puppet. 12/22/2011

Why Python?

  • Perl not comfortable
  • Python is comfortable
  • They use Nagios and needed custom bits

Sys admin constraints

  • 5% programmer
  • Using older versions of Python on older systems
  • Security/priviledge issues
  • Integration (system commands, file-system, GUIs, web)
  • Heavy Data processing

Q&A

  • System monitoring & reporting
  • They use Nagios
  • Backups and recovery
  • Configuration management
  • User accounts and security / SSH
  • Using python for virtual servers/testbeds