CfgMgmtCamp 2025

Vuokko Vuorinnen

• 2 min read
CfgMgmtCamp 2025
Photo by Taylor Vick / Unsplash

Here's my thoughts on this year's CfgMgmtCamp, generated by ChatGPT, because you know, AI is the future:

Day 1 Highlights

  1. Working Configs, Humanity, The Real World, Joy, and Happiness: Pick Two(ish)
    Explored the philosophical side of software and configuration as collaborative processes, not just technical tasks. Included case studies of major failures highlighting the human element in tech.
  2. OpenTofu: 18 Months Later
    Focused on OpenTofu’s growth post-Terraform license changes. Key features include state encryption and v1.9 updates. Some felt it was more promotional than technical.
  3. It's All About the Ecosystem, Baby
    Emphasized the importance of ecosystems over individual tools, comparing successes like VS Code. Discussions leaned into open-source licensing and community-driven development, with anti-corporate undertones.
  4. Lightning Talks
    Fast-paced sessions covering random tech topics, with highlights like exiting ed and quick dives into Nix/Flox.
  5. Mgmt Config: Running in Production and Best Practices
    Showcased Mgmt as a powerful real-time automation tool with dynamic scheduling and closed-loop feedback capabilities.
  6. Elevate Your Infrastructure - Crossplane
    Demonstrated Crossplane’s potential as a cloud-native control plane, simplifying infrastructure management through Kubernetes-native APIs.

Day 2 Highlights

  1. Troubleshooting Distributed Systems
    Differentiated troubleshooting from debugging, with tips on tackling complex distributed issues. Key takeaways included avoiding management-driven biases and the hidden complexity of configuration defaults.
  2. Pulling Infrastructure Coding Out of the Value Stream
    Discussed the shift from imperative to declarative infrastructure coding for efficiency.
  3. Pkl-ing Your Config
    Presented Pkl for data validation in config files, showing strong potential for maintaining config integrity.
  4. Why Great People Don’t Want to Work with You
    Addressed hiring vs. recruiting, effective job ads, and lessons from open-source communities about asynchronous, transparent work environments.
  5. OSS vs. Source Available
    Clarified the difference between true open-source and "source-available" models, stressing community as upstream and customers as downstream.
  6. You’re Doing Ansible Roles All Wrong
    Packed session on optimizing Ansible roles—encouraging collection-based roles, proper documentation, and best practices for development environments.
  7. From Deming to DevOps
    Philosophical reflections on AI’s role in DevOps, shadow AI risks, and security vulnerabilities related to AI systems.

Notable Trends:

  • Strong focus on open-source ecosystems, licensing, and community-driven development.
  • Anti-corporate and socio-political undertones, with discussions referencing current U.S. political climates.
  • Philosophical themes around collaboration, tooling ecosystems, and AI’s evolving role.