Puppet causes endless restarts of CUPS (how does one prevent this)

Solution 1:

You could copy the file to another name, and have an exec to only copy if printers.conf doesn't contain a line you require. Eg.

    file { "/etc/cups/printers.conf.puppet":
                source  => "puppet:///modules/desktop/cups/printers.conf",
                mode    => 0600,
                owner   => root,
                group   => lp;
    }

    # cups will put it's own timestamp in printers.conf, causing a loop if
    # puppet always replaces if the timestamp is different. This only replaces
    # the file is HP-Laserjet is not present
    exec { "/bin/cp /etc/cups/printers.conf.puppet /etc/cups/printers.conf":
            unless => '/bin/grep "HP-LaserJet-2300" /etc/cups/printers.conf 2>/dev/null',
            subscribe => File["/etc/cups/printers.conf.puppet"],
            refreshonly => "true",
            require => Package["cups"],
            notify => Service["cups"],
    }

Solution 2:

An alternative approach is using lpadmin to add the printer to CUPS, in case it's missing from printers.conf.

For example:

exec {
    "/usr/sbin/lpadmin -p Lexmark-E450 -E -v usb://Lexmark/E450 -P /path/to/Lexmark_E450.ppd":
    unless => "/bin/grep Lexmark-E450 /etc/cups/printers.conf 2>/dev/null",
    require => File["/path/to/Lexmark_E450.ppd"];
}

This way we avoid messing with printers.conf while CUPS is running. To remove a printer, we can use lpadmin -x PRINTER-NAME (see the lpadmin manpage)

A more concrete example:

class print-common::lex250 {
    exec {
        "/usr/sbin/lpadmin -p Lexmark-E250 -E -v usb://Lexmark/E250d -P /path/to/PRINTER.ppd":
        unless => "/bin/grep Lexmark-E250 /etc/cups/printers.conf 2>/dev/null",
        require => File["/path/to/PRINTER.ppd"];
    }
}


class print-common {
    package {
        "cups": ensure => installed;
    }

    service {
        "cups":
            ensure => running,
            require => Package["cups"],
            subscribe => File["/etc/cups/cupsd.conf"];
    }

    file {
        "/etc/cups/cupsd.conf":
        ensure => present,
        owner => root,
        group => root,
        mode => 644,
        source => "puppet://puppet.mr.lan/files/etc/cups/cupsd.conf";

        "/path/to/ppd/":
        ensure => directory;

        "/path/to/PRINTER.ppd":
        ensure => present,
        owner => root,
        group => root,
        mode => 644,
        source => "puppet://puppet.mr.lan/files/path/to/PRINTER.ppd",
        require => File["/path/to/ppd/"];
    }

    case $fqdn {
            'host1.domain.name','host2.domain.name': { include print-common::lex250 }
    }
}

The print-common::lex250 could then probably be factored out to something reusable, using variable magic etc.

Solution 3:

Since cupsd insists to modify printers.conf you can't replace the whole file, instead you need to modify it on a line by line basis. Check out http://projects.puppetlabs.com/projects/puppet/wiki/Simple_Text_Patterns it'll show you how to replace parts of a file.