Configuring the Salt Minion

The Salt system is amazingly simple and easy to configure, the two components of the Salt system each have a respective configuration file. The salt-master is configured via the master configuration file, and the salt-minion is configured via the minion configuration file.

The Salt Minion configuration is very simple, typically the only value that needs to be set is the master value so the minion can find its master.

Minion Primary Configuration

master

Default: salt

The hostname or ipv4 of the master.

master: salt

master_port

Default: 4506

The port of the master ret server, this needs to coincide with the ret_port option on the Salt master.

master_port: 4506

user

Default: root

The user to run the Salt processes

user: root

pidfile

Default: /var/run/salt-minion.pid

The location of the daemon's process ID file

pidfie: /var/run/salt-minion.pid

root_dir

Default: /

This directory is prepended to the following options: pki_dir, cachedir, log_file, sock_dir, and pidfile.

root_dir: /

pki_dir

Default: /etc/salt/pki

The directory used to store the minion's public and private keys.

pki_dir: /etc/salt/pki

id

Default: hostname (as returned by the Python call: socket.getfqdn())

Explicitly declare the id for this minion to use, if left commented the id will be the hostname as returned by the Python call: socket.getfqdn() Since Salt uses detached ids it is possible to run multiple minions on the same machine but with different ids, this can be useful for Salt compute clusters.

id: foo.bar.com

append_domain

Default: None

Append a domain to a hostname in the event that it does not exist. This is useful for systems where socket.getfqdn() does not actually result in a FQDN (for instance, Solaris).

append_domain: foo.org

cachedir

Default: /var/cache/salt

The location for minion cache data.

cachedir: /var/cache/salt

verify_env

Default: True

Verify and set permissions on configuration directories at startup.

verify_env: True

cache_jobs

Default: False

The minion can locally cache the return data from jobs sent to it, this can be a good way to keep track of the minion side of the jobs the minion has executed. By default this feature is disabled, to enable set cache_jobs to True.

cache_jobs: False

sock_dir

Default: /var/run/salt/minion

The directory where Unix sockets will be kept.

sock_dir: /var/run/salt/minion

backup_mode

Default: []

Backup files replaced by file.managed and file.recurse under cachedir.

backup_mode: minion

acceptance_wait_time

Default: 10

The number of seconds to wait until attempting to re-authenticate with the master.

acceptance_wait_time: 10

dns_check

Default: True

When healing, a dns_check is run. This is to make sure that the originally resolved dns has not changed. If this is something that does not happen in your environment, set this value to False.

dns_check: True

ipc_mode

Default: ipc

Windows platforms lack POSIX IPC and must rely on slower TCP based inter- process communications. Set ipc_mode to tcp on such systems.

ipc_mode: ipc

tcp_pub_port

Default: 4510

Publish port used when ipc_mode is set to tcp.

tcp_pub_port: 4510

tcp_pull_port

Default: 4511

Pull port used when ipc_mode is set to tcp.

tcp_pull_port: 4511

Minion Module Management

disable_modules

Default: [] (all modules are enabled by default)

The event may occur in which the administrator desires that a minion should not be able to execute a certain module. The sys module is built into the minion and cannot be disabled.

This setting can also tune the minion, as all modules are loaded into ram disabling modules will lover the minion's ram footprint.

disable_modules:
  - test
  - solr

disable_returners

Default: [] (all returners are enabled by default)

If certain returners should be disabled, this is the place

disable_returners:
  - mongo_return

module_dirs

Default: []

A list of extra directories to search for Salt modules

module_dirs:
  - /var/lib/salt/modules

returner_dirs

Default: []

A list of extra directories to search for Salt returners

returners_dirs:
  - /var/lib/salt/returners

states_dirs

Default: []

A list of extra directories to search for Salt states

states_dirs:
  - /var/lib/salt/states

render_dirs

Default: []

A list of extra directories to search for Salt renderers

render_dirs:
  - /var/lib/salt/renderers

cython_enable

Default: False

Set this value to true to enable auto-loading and compiling of .pyx modules, This setting requires that gcc and cython are installed on the minion

cython_enable: False

providers

Default: (empty)

A module provider can be statically overwritten or extended for the minion via the providers option. This can be done on an individual basis in an SLS file, or globally here in the minion config, like below.

providers:
  pkg: yumpkg5
  service: systemd

State Management Settings

renderer

Default: yaml_jinja

The default renderer used for local state executions

renderer: yaml_jinja

state_verbose

Default: False

state_verbose allows for the data returned from the minion to be more verbose. Normally only states that fail or states that have changes are returned, but setting state_verbose to True will return all states that were checked

state_verbose: True

state_output

Default: full

The state_output setting changes if the output is the full multi line output for each changed state if set to 'full', but if set to 'terse' the output will be shortened to a single line.

state_output: full

autoload_dynamic_modules

Default: True

autoload_dynamic_modules Turns on automatic loading of modules found in the environments on the master. This is turned on by default, to turn of auto-loading modules when states run set this value to False

autoload_dynamic_modules: True

Default: True

clean_dynamic_modules keeps the dynamic modules on the minion in sync with the dynamic modules on the master, this means that if a dynamic module is not on the master it will be deleted from the minion. By default this is enabled and can be disabled by changing this value to False

clean_dynamic_modules: True

environment

Default: None

Normally the minion is not isolated to any single environment on the master when running states, but the environment can be isolated on the minion side by statically setting it. Remember that the recommended way to manage environments is to isolate via the top file.

environment: None

Security Settings

open_mode

Default: False

Open mode can be used to clean out the PKI key received from the Salt master, turn on open mode, restart the minion, then turn off open mode and restart the minion to clean the keys.

open_mode: False

Thread Settings

Default: True

Disable multiprocessing support by default when a minion receives a publication a new process is spawned and the command is executed therein.

multiprocessing: True

Minion Logging Settings

log_file

Default: /var/log/salt/minion

The minion log can be sent to a regular file, local path name, or network location. Remote logging works best when configured to use rsyslogd(8) (e.g.: file:///dev/log), with rsyslogd(8) configured for network logging. The format for remote addresses is: <file|udp|tcp>://<host|socketpath>:<port-if-required>/<log-facility>. Examples:

log_file: /var/log/salt/minion
log_file: file:///dev/log
log_file: udp://loghost:10514

log_level

Default: warning

The level of messages to send to the console. One of 'garbage', 'trace', 'debug', info', 'warning', 'error', 'critical'.

log_level: warning

log_level_logfile

Default: warning

The level of messages to send to the log file. One of 'garbage', 'trace', 'debug', info', 'warning', 'error', 'critical'.

log_level_logfile: warning

log_datefmt

Default: %H:%M:%S

The date and time format used in console log messages. Allowed date/time formatting can be seen on http://docs.python.org/library/time.html#time.strftime

log_datefmt: '%H:%M:%S'

log_datefmt_logfile

Default: %Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S

The date and time format used in log file messages. Allowed date/time formatting can be seen on http://docs.python.org/library/time.html#time.strftime

log_datefmt_logfile: '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S'

log_fmt_console

Default: [%(levelname)-8s] %(message)s

The format of the console logging messages. Allowed formatting options can be seen on http://docs.python.org/library/logging.html#logrecord-attributes

log_fmt_console: '[%(levelname)-8s] %(message)s'

log_fmt_logfile

Default: %(asctime)s,%(msecs)03.0f [%(name)-17s][%(levelname)-8s] %(message)s

The format of the log file logging messages. Allowed formatting options can be seen on http://docs.python.org/library/logging.html#logrecord-attributes

log_fmt_logfile: '%(asctime)s,%(msecs)03.0f [%(name)-17s][%(levelname)-8s] %(message)s'

log_granular_levels

Default: {}

This can be used to control logging levels more specifically. This example sets the main salt library at the 'warning' level, but sets 'salt.modules' to log at the 'debug' level:

log_granular_levels:
  'salt': 'warning',
  'salt.modules': 'debug'

default_include

Default: minion.d/*.conf

The minion can include configuration from other files. Per default the minion will automatically include all config files from minion.d/*.conf where minion.d is relative to the directory of the minion configuration file.

include

Default: not defined

The minion can include configuration from other files. To enable this, pass a list of paths to this option. The paths can be either relative or absolute; if relative, they are considered to be relative to the directory the main minion configuration file lives in. Paths can make use of shell-style globbing. If no files are matched by a path passed to this option then the minion will log a warning message.

# Include files from a minion.d directory in the same
# directory as the minion config file
include: minion.d/*

# Include a single extra file into the configuration
include: /etc/roles/webserver

# Include several files and the minion.d directory
include:
  - extra_config
  - minion.d/*
  - /etc/roles/webserver

Frozen Build Update Settings

These options control how salt.modules.saltutil.update() works with esky frozen apps. For more information look at https://github.com/cloudmatrix/esky/.

update_url

Default: False (Update feature is disabled)

The url to use when looking for application updates. Esky depends on directory listings to search for new versions. A webserver running on your Master is a good starting point for most setups.

update_url: 'http://salt.example.com/minion-updates'

update_restart_services

Default: [] (service restarting on update is disabled)

A list of services to restart when the minion software is updated. This would typically just be a list containing the minion's service name, but you may have other services that need to go with it.

update_restart_services: ['salt-minion']