Salt Minion Installation

Owned by Swaminathan Mathivanan
Last updated: Sept 01, 2020
3 min read

Salt Minion Installation

First, we will install the software on our minion server.

[root@host ~]# apt -y install salt-minion Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done The following additional packages will be installed: dctrl-tools debconf-utils Suggested packages: debtags python3-augeas The following NEW packages will be installed: dctrl-tools debconf-utils salt-minion 0 upgraded, 3 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded. Need to get 146 kB of archives. After this operation, 527 kB of additional disk space will be used. Get:1 http://by.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu bionic/main amd64 dctrl-tools amd64 2.24-2build1 [60,9 kB] Get:2 http://by.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu bionic-updates/universe amd64 debconf-utils all 1.5.66ubuntu1 [56,6 kB] Get:3 http://repo.saltstack.com/py3/ubuntu/18.04/amd64/latest bionic/main amd64 salt-minion all 3000+ds-1 [28,1 kB] Fetched 146 kB in 1s (235 kB/s) Selecting previously unselected package dctrl-tools. (Reading database ... 178806 files and directories currently installed.) Preparing to unpack .../dctrl-tools_2.24-2build1_amd64.deb ... Unpacking dctrl-tools (2.24-2build1) ... Selecting previously unselected package debconf-utils. Preparing to unpack .../debconf-utils_1.5.66ubuntu1_all.deb ... Unpacking debconf-utils (1.5.66ubuntu1) ... Selecting previously unselected package salt-minion. Preparing to unpack .../salt-minion_3000+ds-1_all.deb ... Unpacking salt-minion (3000+ds-1) ... Setting up debconf-utils (1.5.66ubuntu1) ... Setting up dctrl-tools (2.24-2build1) ... Setting up salt-minion (3000+ds-1) ... Created symlink /etc/systemd/system/multi-user.target.wants/salt-minion.service → /lib/systemd/system/salt-minion.service. Processing triggers for ureadahead (0.100.0-21) ... Processing triggers for systemd (237-3ubuntu10.39) ... Processing triggers for man-db (2.8.3-2ubuntu0.1) ... [root@host ~]#

Salt Minion Configuration

Next, we will configure the software on the minion server. By default, the Salt Minion connects to the master Salt servers DNS named above in the /etc/hosts file. We will need to modify this setting. Again we will use our vim editor and open the file /etc/hosts and add the IP of the Salt Master. In this case 10.0.2.15. After that entry is created, save the file using :wq.

127.0.0.1 localhost <xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx> saltmaster # The following lines are desirable for IPv6 capable hosts ::1 localhost ip6-localhost ip6-loopback ff02::1 ip6-allnodes ff02::2 ip6-allrouters

Now, we need to create a unique identifier for the Salt minion.

vim /etc/salt/minion_id

Let’s add the identifier name for the minion. Care should be taken to create a naming scheme in advance to allow for additional minions e.g.

  • processing_nodes_1

  • ingestion _nodes_1

  • node.location.dept-ubuntu_01

We will use ubuntu-minion_01 as our salt minion server name.

Next, copy the master.pub fingerprint we created on the master server above, and set this value as the master_finger setting in the minion configuration file /etc/salt/minion_id. You can search for this value in vim using /finger within the file. After adding the fingerprint, use :wq to save the and exit the file.

If you change any of the settings (like the IP address of the salt master in /etc/salt/minion), you’ll need to restart salt-minion service

Now, login to the salt master server and list/check for the Accepted Keys using the following command.

As you can see, we now have a key waiting to be accepted “ubuntu-minion_01“. Next, we will accept the salt-key for the minion on the salt master server.

Now we can run the following command on the Salt minion to check the minions key fingerprint.

Next, we can compare the above value to the value that is shown when we run the command “salt-key –finger <MINION_ID>” on the Salt master.

Now, let's verify the communication between the salt master and the salt minion by running the test.ping command.

Success!