Fall '25 Week 3
YouTube VideoResources
Video Script
Hello and welcome to the week three announcements video for CIS 527 and CC510 in fall 2025. So this week you should be working on lab one. Lab one is due tomorrow by 7 p.m. So make sure you get that done. Basically all you need to do if you haven’t already is schedule a grading time with either Josh or myself. We will meet with you on Zoom. We will have you share your screen and walk through getting all your lab graded. Remember that every day a lab is late. It is 10% off of the total points in the class or in the project. So this lab is worth 50 points. If you get graded after Wednesday, it’s going to be worth 45 points and it goes down from there. Then next week on Wednesday, the module two quizzes are due. And then the week after that on Wednesday the 24th, Lab 2 is due. Lab two, you don’t have to schedule a grading time for. All the grading for that is done on Canvas. So unless you have questions or want to do an interactive grading, all you have to do for Lab 2 is submit your two puppet manifest files on Canvas and we’ll grade those offline. Also, our first discussion is going to be coming up soon. I’m still waiting to hear back from some of our speakers and I’ll talk about that in just a second.
So the discussion sessions, it looks like Tuesdays at 2.30 is the time that works for everybody. So I’m going to get that on the calendar. Starting not this week, but next week, I will try and have office hours during the Tuesdays from 2.30 to 3.30 time slot. I’m going to send some invites to speakers that are people in industry working in IT and related fields. And our first speaker is to be announced very shortly. I’m hoping it’s Seth Gallitzer, and I can get him in here in the next couple of weeks. So watch for more announcements for that. As soon as the discussion sessions are announced, you’ll be given a week to come up with questions that you want to ask our speaker. There’ll be an assignment posted on Canvas. You just submit a couple of questions and then join the live discussion session or watch the video afterward to get points.
So we’re going into lab two. The point of lab two is to basically redo the first lab, but this time you’re going to use Puppet. So for this lab, you’re going to start with two brand new VMs. You’re going to reinstall the operating system. You’re going to do some updates, install Puppet, and then you’re going to make a snapshot at that point. You don’t have to do any other setup other than what the lab tells you to do. Basically install the OS, set the computer name, do some updates, install Puppet, make a snapshot. Then what you’re going to do is you’re going to write a Puppet manifest file to do all the rest of the setup, including creating user accounts, installing software, setting up files and folder permissions, groups, et cetera, et cetera. You’re going to write a manifest file to do all of that for you, and you’re going to test that manifest.
The easiest way to test that manifest is to copy paste it into the VM, run the puppet manifest, and then for testing, you need to run it, reboot, and run it again, and then check to see if everything works. The reason you have to reboot, if you’re a member from Lab 1, is group memberships do not take effect immediately. They need a reboot for them to take effect. And so you run your puppet manifest, reboot for the groups to take effect, run it again to get the file permissions right, and then check for everything. Try and keep your puppet manifest very simple. A good solution is less than 200 lines of code. I think my solution is even less than 100 lines of code. It can be very simple. Use the puppet resource command to query the system as it’s set up, but don’t use the output of that. Just use individual lines of things you want to change. Kind of follow my lab instructions, but remember a solution can be pretty simple.
So another big thing to keep in mind in this class is a growth mindset. The labs in this class are challenging. They are meant to be challenging. This is a 500 level technical elective for a lot of you. And if you aren’t challenged, then you don’t learn and you don’t grow. So you need to come into this with a growth mindset. You can do it. Anybody can do it, but it is going to be challenging. The things that you can do for success, read the link to documentation, ask for clarification on things, start early on the lab and try and work through it methodically. I guarantee a recipe for not succeeding in this class is to wait until the Sunday before lab is due and then start on the lab because you’re going to run out of time and you won’t have time to ask questions. So start early, work methodically, and make snapshots. Snapshots in VMware are your friend. They are the auto-saves that you can use to go back anytime you need to go back.
So other than that, if you have any questions, you can keep in touch. We’ll have good discussions on Ed Discussion. You’ll see a mega thread posted there for every lab so you can work there. I’m going to start doing office hours like I scheduled next Tuesday starting at 2.30. So you can join office hours or you can always schedule a one-on-one time.
Also, don’t forget coming up tomorrow is the ACM Back to School Bash. It is Wednesday, September 10th in the engineering atrium from 5 to 7 p.m. It is open to everybody, computer science students, ICS students. If you are in this class, you are welcome to attend. The Back to School Bash is a great way to see what the student organizations are up to in computer science. You can learn about ACM, Cyber Defense Club, Hat Case State, all of the things that are going on. They’re going to have free food. So I encourage you to sign up and join. Again, back to School Bash is tomorrow, Wednesday, September 10th from 5 to 7 in the engineering atrium.
So hopefully things are going well. I know I’m asking you to do things again. That’s the way it goes in computer science, but you’re going to get really good at it. So hopefully it’s not too bad to have to do a lab setup again. As always, if you have any questions, let me know. Otherwise, best of luck, and I will see you again next week.