[CentOS] howto transfer all configuration between 2 remote dedicated servers?

[Dag Wieers]

On Thu, 20 Nov 2008, Joe Barjo wrote:

> But my real question is: How can I get a list of files in the whole
> filesystem that were added or modified compared to all the files that come
> from rpms?
> Is there a script for doing such a thing?

You may be interested in a tool I wrote some time ago that makes a 
hardware and software snapshot of a system, including the latent 
configuration in memory (like routing information or firewall rules).

It creates the snapshots in single compressed text files periodically 
(hourly, daily, weekly, monthly from cron) that can be diffed. And it 
allows to send out diffs to one or more email-addresses if configured to 
do so.

It was written with multiple use cases in mind:

  - compare identical systems (eg. nodes in a cluster, or when migrating
    servers)

  - mail changes to a group of co-maintaining sysadmins (so configuration
    changes are communicated and if needed acted upon)

  - backing up a complete system's HW/SW configuration and making diffs
    with past configurations for troubleshooting problems

  - taking system configurations with you (as a consultant or support
    organisation it is nice to follow-up on system changes made
    by the customer)

The tool is called dconf. You can find it in RPMforge.

The tool is as good as its configuration. The default configuration 
already contains a lot for RHEL/CentOS, but it could use more people 
defining more tools/configuration file. And I am open for improving the 
tool beyond what it does now.

Feedback appreciated,
-- 
--   dag wieers,  dag at centos.org,  http://dag.wieers.com/   --
[Any errors in spelling, tact or fact are transmission errors]