Building a self healing system with SaltStack

Building a self healing system with SaltStack

FOSDEM 2020

As the number of servers that we are responsible for increases, the ability to manage issues on those systems becomes more and more difficult. Situations arise like log files filling up disks, failed login attempts that could be brute force attacks, and unwanted processes and services running. Using the Beacon and Reactor systems of SaltStack, we can monitor a system for these have SaltStack restore those systems to the desired state. In this talk, we’ll look at some real-life examples of these scenarios and how Saltstack can help to automatically heal the systems.

As the number of servers that we are responsible for increases, the ability to manage issues on those systems becomes more and more difficult. Situations arise like log files filling up disks, failed login attempts that could be brute force attacks, and unwanted processes and services running.

Using the Beacon system of SaltStack, we can monitor a system for these & other scenarios. Pairing this with the Reactor system, we can have SaltStack restore those systems to the desired state.

In this talk, we’ll look at some real-life examples of these scenarios and how Saltstack can help to automatically heal the systems.

The talk will include:

• A brief introduction to Salt Stack.
• Using Salt Beacons to monitor aspects of a system.
• Using Salt Reactors to react to events from the Salt Beacons.
• Using those reactors to re-mediate issues as they occur.

Speakers: Gareth J Greenaway