In this chapter, we have explored new territories for Puppet. We have gone beyond server operating systems and have seen how it is possible to also manage network and storage equipments and how Puppet can help us work with the cloud.

We have seen that there are two general approaches to the management of devices: the proxy one, which is mostly implemented by the puppet device application and has a specific operational approach, and the native one, where Puppet runs directly on the managed devices and behaves like it does in a normal node.

We have also reviewed the modules available to manage virtualization and cloud-related setups. Some of them configure normal resources on a system; others expand Puppet applications to allow the creation of and interaction with cloud instances.

Puppet is well placed for the future challenges that a software-defined data center involves, but its evolution is an ongoing process in many fields.

In the next chapter, we are going to explore how Puppet is...