Razor server

Razor is an advanced provisioning application which can deploy both bare-metal and virtual systems. It's aimed at solving the problem of how to bring new metal into a state where your existing DevOps/configuration management workflows can take it over.

Newly added machines in a Razor deployment will PXE-boot from a special Razor Microkernel image, then check in, provide Razor with inventory information, and wait for further instructions. Razor will consult user-created policy rules to choose which tasks to apply to a new node, which will begin to follow the task directions, giving feedback to Razor as it completes various steps. Tasks can include steps for handoff to a DevOps system such as Puppet or to any other system capable of controlling the node (such as a vCenter server taking possession of ESX systems).

Getting in touch

• bug/issue tracker: RAZOR project in JIRA
• on IRC: #puppet-razor on freenode
• mailing list: [email protected]

Getting started

The Wiki has all the details; in particular look at

• Installation: how to get a Razor environment up and running
• Getting started: using the CLI to do useful things
• Developer setup: for when you feel like hacking
• Documentation: for when you want to learn how to use Razor

What does Razor do anyway?

Razor is a power control, provisioning, and management application designed to deploy both bare-metal and virtual computer resources. Razor provides broker plugins for integration with third party configuration systems such as Puppet.

Razor does this by discovering new nodes using facter, tagging nodes using facts based on user-supplied rules and deciding what to install through matching tags to user-supplied policies. Installation itself is handled flexibly through ERB templating all installer files. Once installation completes, the node can be handed off to a broker, typically a configuration management system. Razor makes this handoff seamless and flexible.

Razor MicroKernel

The MicroKernel is a small OS image that Razor boots on new nodes to do discovery. It periodically submits facts about the node and waits for instructions from the server about what to do next, if anything.

A prebuilt archive is available.

Razor Client

The Client is a small Ruby script that makes interacting with the server from the command line easier. It lets you explore what the server knows about your infrastructure, and modify how machines are provisioned, by interacting with the Razor server API

Reference

• Original Razor Overview: Nickapedia.com
• Razor Session from PuppetConf 2012: Youtube

License

Razor is distributed under the Apache 2.0 license. See the LICENSE file for full details.