Maintain systems via configuration management tools

- [Instructor] Once you have more than…a handful of systems,…managing them can be pretty time consuming.…Luckily, there are a few categories of tools…that are designed to make managing large deployments…easier, faster, and more reliable.…These tools generally break down into two categories,…though there is some overlap here and there…between particular solutions.…When you go to build a system like a web app…with a few database servers and storage hosts,…you'll probably draw up a diagram…of what the system should look like,…what operating systems the machine should have,…what software should be installed,…what the network looks like, and so on.…

Laying out a system and performing its initial setup…is called provisioning.…Once the system is deployed, or provisioned,…it will require ongoing maintenance…and configuration changes…generally grouped under the heading of…configuration management.…The function of these tools is to work…with existing machines,…to maintain lists of them and their configurations,…and to push out configuration changes…