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By starting the daemon called cfd
, you can set up a line of
communication between hosts, allowing them to exchange files across
the network or execute cfengine remotely on another system.
Cfengine network services are built around the following components:
cfengine
-
The configuration engine, whose only contact with the netork is via
remote copy requests. This component does the hard work of configuring
the system based on rules specified in the file `cfengine.conf'. It
does not and cannot grant any access to a system from the network.
cfd
-
A daemon which acts as both a file server and a remote-cfengine
executor. This daemon authenticates requests from the network and
processes them according to rules specified in `cfd.conf'.
It works as a file server and as a mechanism for starting
cfengine on a local host and piping its output back to the
network connection.
cfrun
-
This is a simple initiation program which can be used
to run cfengine on a number of remote hosts. It cannot
be used to tell cfengine what to do, it can only ask cfengine
on the remote host to run the configuration file it already
has. Anyone could be allowed to run this program, it does not
require any special user privileges. A locking mechanism
in cfengine prevents its abuse by spamming.
cfwatch
-
This program (which is not a part of the distribution: it is left for
others to implement) should provide a graphical user interface for
watching over the configuration of hosts running cfengine and logging
their output.
With these components you can emulate programs like rdist
whose job it is to check and maintain copies of files on client machines.
You may also decide who has permission to run cfengine and how often it
may be run, without giving away any special user privileges.
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