Perform Puppet baseline testing

Overview

You can perform baseline testing of Puppet on a GCP SUSE Arm64 VM to make sure your installation works as expected. In this Learning Path, you’ll verify Puppet and Facter versions, run basic Puppet commands, apply a simple manifest, and confirm that system facts are collected correctly. These steps help you validate your setup before moving on to advanced Puppet tasks.

Verify the Puppet installation

Verify that Puppet and Facter are correctly installed and respond to version checks.

Check the Puppet version:

    

        
        
puppet --version

    

The output shows the installed version:

    

        
        8.10.0

        
    

Check the Facter version:

    

        
        
facter --version

    

The output shows the Facter version:

    

        
        4.10.0

        
    

Check the Ruby version, which is a dependency for Puppet:

    

        
        
ruby -v

    

The output confirms the Ruby version and architecture:

    

        
        ruby 3.1.4p223 (2023-03-30 revision 957bb7cb81) [aarch64-linux]

        
    

Run a simple Puppet command

Check that Puppet responds to commands by running puppet help. If the help menu appears, Puppet is working correctly.

Run the puppet help command:

    

        
        
puppet help

    

The output displays the help menu, confirming Puppet is operational:

    

        
        Usage: puppet <subcommand> [options] <action> [options]

Available subcommands:

  Common:
    agent             The puppet agent daemon
    apply             Apply Puppet manifests locally
    config            Interact with Puppet's settings.
    help              Display Puppet help.
    lookup            Interactive Hiera lookup
    module            Creates, installs and searches for modules on the Puppet Forge.
    resource          The resource abstraction layer shell


  Specialized:
    catalog           Compile, save, view, and convert catalogs.
    describe          Display help about resource types
    device            Manage remote network devices
    doc               Generate Puppet references
    epp               Interact directly with the EPP template parser/renderer.
    facts             Retrieve and store facts.
    filebucket        Store and retrieve files in a filebucket
    generate          Generates Puppet code from Ruby definitions.
    node              View and manage node definitions.
    parser            Interact directly with the parser.
    plugin            Interact with the Puppet plugin system.
    script            Run a puppet manifests as a script without compiling a catalog
    ssl               Manage SSL keys and certificates for puppet SSL clients

See 'puppet help <subcommand> <action>' for help on a specific subcommand action.
See 'puppet help <subcommand>' for help on a specific subcommand.
Puppet v8.10.0

        
    

Test a simple Puppet manifest

Create a basic Puppet script to make sure Puppet can apply configurations. The purpose of this script is to verify that Puppet can successfully apply configurations on your system. If the script runs and creates the specified test file, it confirms that your Puppet agent is functioning correctly:

    

        
        
cd ~
cat <<EOF > test.pp
file { '/tmp/puppet_test.txt':
  ensure  => file,
  content => "Hello from Puppet on SUSE ARM64!\n",
}
EOF

    

Run the script:

    

        
        
puppet apply test.pp

    

You should see an output similar to:

    

        
        Notice: Compiled catalog for danson-puppet-2.c.arm-deveco-stedvsl-prd.internal in environment production in 0.01 seconds
Notice: /Stage[main]/Main/File[/tmp/puppet_test.txt]/ensure: defined content as '{sha256}bcf972b61979afe69626549b3f3f30798aeb50b359e76603a36e96b2abbe73c0'
Notice: Applied catalog in 0.01 seconds

        
    

Open the file created by Puppet to confirm the content matches your script. This step validates that Puppet executed your manifest correctly:

    

        
        
cat /tmp/puppet_test.txt

    

Output:

    

        
        Hello from Puppet on SUSE ARM64!

        
    

Check Facter integration

Run facter commands to verify that it collects accurate system details, such as the OS and CPU type. This ensures Puppet can gather the facts it needs for automation decisions.

Check the OS:

    

        
        
facter os

    

The output is similar to the following:

    

        
        {
  architecture => "aarch64",
  distro => {
    codename => "n/a",
    description => "SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP6",
    id => "SUSE",
    release => {
      full => "15.6",
      major => "15",
      minor => "6"
    }
  },
  family => "Suse",
  hardware => "aarch64",
  name => "SLES",
  release => {
    full => "15.6",
    major => "15",
    minor => "6"
  },
  selinux => {
    enabled => false
  }
}

        
    

Check the architecture:

    

        
        
facter architecture

    

The output is:

    

        
        aarch64

        
    

Check the processors:

    

        
        
facter processors

    

The output is similar to the following:

    

        
        {
  cores => 4,
  count => 4,
  extensions => [
    "aarch64"
  ],
  isa => "aarch64",
  models => [

  ],
  physicalcount => 1,
  threads => 1
}

        
    

What you’ve accomplished and what’s next

You’ve completed the essential baseline checks for Puppet on your GCP SUSE Arm64 VM. At this point, you’ve:

• Verified that Puppet, Facter, and Ruby are installed and working
• Confirmed Puppet responds to commands and applies manifests
• Validated that Facter collects accurate system facts

This progress means your environment is ready for more advanced testing. Next, you’ll move on to Puppet benchmarking, where you’ll run workload-focused tests to measure performance on your GCP SUSE VM.