[matt-snider]

I previously tried configuration management using various techniques. First the plain home git repo, then rcm [1], then briefly stow.

What I found, is that while these systems all worked reasonably well, I ended up writing out several manual steps in README files (e.g. install packages xyz, create user/group, create directory, enable systemd unit, replace {some_template_var} in fileX before copying, etc).

Ansible seemed like a reasonable solution so I switched to that and it's worked out very well for me.

Pros: - all steps can be encoded as config (config-only updates can still be run using tags) - a fresh install can be ready to use in minutes

Cons: - overhead encoding copy operations - slower then alternatives if just updating config (e.g. stow or rcm)