1. Overview
2. Setup
   • What swap_file affects
3. Usage
4. Limitations
5. Upgrading from 1.0.1 Release
6. Development

Manage swap files for your Linux environments. This is based on the gist by @Yggdrasil, with a few changes and added specs.

• Creating a swap-file on disk. This uses dd by default, but can use fallocate optionally for performance reasons. Note: Using fallocate to create a ZFS file system will fail: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1129205
• Swapfiles on the system
• Any mounts of swapfiles

The simplest use of the module is this:

swap_file::files { 'default':
  ensure   => present,
}

By default, the module it will:

• create a file using /bin/dd at /mnt/swap.1 with the default size taken from the $::memorysize fact in megabytes (eg. 8GB RAM will create an 8GB swap file)
• A mount for the swapfile created

For a custom setup, you can do something like this:

swap_file::files { 'tmp file swap':
  ensure    => present,
  swapfile  => '/tmp/swapfile',
  add_mount => false,
}

To use fallocate for swap file creation instead of dd:

swap_file::files { 'tmp file swap':
  ensure    => present,
  swapfile  => '/tmp/swapfile',
  cmd       => 'fallocate',
}

To remove a prexisting swap, you can use ensure absent:

swap_file::files { 'tmp file swap':
  ensure   => absent,
}

To choose the size of the swap file instead of defaulting to memory size:

swap_file::files { '5GB Swap':
  ensure       => present,
  swapfile     => '/mnt/swap.5gb',
  swapfilesize => '5GB',
}

You can also use hiera to call this module and set the configuration.

The simplest use of the module with hiera is this:

classes:
  - swap_file

swap_file::files:
  'default':
    ensure: 'present'

This hiera setup will create a file using /bin/dd atr /mnt/swap.1 with the default size taken from the $::memorysize fact and add a mount resource for it.

You can use all customizations mentioned above in hiera like this:

classes:
  - swap_file

swap_file::files:
  'custom setup':
    ensure: 'present'
    swapfile: '/tmp/swapfile.custom'
    add_mount: false
  'use fallocate':
    swapfile: '/tmp/swapfile.fallocate'
    cmd: 'fallocate'
  'remove swap file'
    ensure: 'absent'
    swapfile: '/tmp/swapfile.old'

This hiera config will respectively:

• create a file /tmp/swapfile.custom using /bin/dd with the default size taken from the $::memorysize fact without creating a mount for it.
• create a file /tmp/swapfile.fallocate using /usr/bin/fallocate with the default size taken from the $::memorysize fact and creating a mount for it.
• deactivates the swapfile /tmp/swapfile.old, deletes it and removes the mount.

Set $files_hiera_merge to true to merge all found instances of swap_file::files in Hiera. This is useful for specifying swap files at different levels of the hierachy and having them all included in the catalog.

Previously you would create swapfiles with the swap_file class:

class { 'swap_file':
  ensure => 'present',
}

However, this had many problems, such as not being able to declare more than one swap_file because of duplicate class errors. Since 2.x.x the swapfiles are created by a defined type instead. The swap_file class is now a wrapper and can handle multiple swap_files.

You can now use:

class { 'swap_file':
  files => {
    'freetext resource name' => {
      ensure => 'present',
    },
  },
}

You can also safely declare mutliple swap file definitions:

class { 'swap_file':
  files => {
    'swapfile' => {
      ensure => 'present',
    },
    'use fallocate' => {
      swapfile => '/tmp/swapfile.fallocate',
      cmd      => 'fallocate',
    },
    'remove swap file' => {
      ensure   => 'absent',
      swapfile => '/tmp/swapfile.old',
    },
  },
}

Primary support is for Debian and RedHat, but should work on all Linux flavours.

Right now there is no BSD support, but I'm planning on adding it in the future

Follow the CONTRIBUTING guidelines! :)

This project was originally authored by Peter Souter. The maintainer preferred that Vox Pupuli take ownership of the project for future improvement and maintenance. Existing pull requests and issues were transferred over, please fork and continue to contribute here.