The ZENworks Configuration Management management methodology developed by Novell Consulting is based on the following principles:
The ZENworks Configuration Management environment is configured to manage three different staging areas: Development, Test, and Production (referred to as DEV, TEST, and PROD). These stages are considered in the device and key folder structures and their associated naming standards.
Any device managed via ZENworks Configuration Management is registered during its installation and is assigned to different device groups based on the product and support pack being installed, and on its function. Up to three registration keys are used:
Location key: Determines the placement of the device object in the ZENworks Configuration Management folder structure.
Update Group key: Determines membership in device groups that govern patch assignments.
Configuration Group key: Determines membership in device groups that manage deployment of configuration settings.
Software updates (patches) are managed in the following ways:
A regular update bundle from the Novell patch channel for a specific product and service pack (such as SLES 11 SP1) is copied at a specific time to obtain a frozen version that is not updated again from this point in time.
The bundle is initially intended for the DEV stage and is named according to a defined naming standard. For more information, see Section 12.1.1, Naming Standards for Frozen Patch Levels.
The assignment of the frozen bundle takes place through a bundle group that is assigned to a device group with a development purpose.
When the bundle has proven its stability within the DEV environment, it is assigned to a bundle group representing the next stage. After passing all verifications in the TEST environment, it is assigned to the final production stage. A number of older frozen patch levels and patch levels that might be required for software components of other vendors (such as Oracle) or for other needs are retained.
When a new frozen patch level needs to be deployed, only the old bundle is removed from the bundle group and the new bundle for the new frozen patch level is added to it. The assignment of the bundle group to the device group is not changed.
In addition to the frozen patch level for updates assigned through bundle groups, the pool bundles (for OES 11, SLES 11 and SLES 11 SP1) and the core bundles (SLES 11 SP2 and later) are directly assigned to the device groups for dependency resolution purposes. Because these bundles never change, no bundle groups are required.
Core bundles have been introduced as a consequence of a recent change to the SUSE Linux Enterprise 11 Maintenance Model.
Configuration bundles that manage configuration settings on the target systems or that deploy software from other vendors are also assigned through bundle groups to devices and device groups.