In this article we will cover installing “PyFi” which is Project FiFo’s Python based console client that enables remote interaction and control of your FiFo cloud via the FiFo API. This is incredibly useful tool and can be used as an alternative method to orchestrate your FiFo cloud via your own in-house web interface. Alternatively you could integrate PyFi scripted workflows with your existing backend systems to deploy or control your virtual machine instances.

For the purposes of this guide, we will be covering installing “PyFi” via the recommended “pip” install method that can be used on any operating system. We will also briefly cover manual setup via a git clone install method. Most Operating System installations should be very similar providing you have Python installed.

Python pip install method

First lets download and install “pip”, a package management system tool for installing and managing Python packages.

curl -O https://bitbucket.org/pypa/setuptools/raw/bootstrap/ez_setup.py
python ez_setup.py
curl -O https://raw.github.com/pypa/pip/master/contrib/get-pip.py
python get-pip.py
sudo pip install --egg pyfi

+++
Now that its installed we first run PyFi to create a generic config file and then secondly, edit the file and save our credentials. Once that is done we can successfully interact via FiFo’s API.

root@localhost:~# fifo vms list
fifo client is not configured creating an example config at: /root/.fifo
root@localhost:~# vi ~/.fifo

filename : .fifo

[GENERAL]
active = fifo_default

[fifo_default]
host = 10.1.1.111
user = peterpan
pass = fairydust

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The first time you successfully authenticate with FiFo, an authentication token will be added to your pyfi “.fifo” configuration file as shown below.

[GENERAL]
active = fifo_default

[fifo_default]
host = 10.1.1.111
user = peterpan
pass = fairydust
token = 616dec22-e85b-4262-9388-5cd8fac48d45

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You will now be able to connect to your fifo host via the API and interact with your SmartOS cloud. Pretty cool huh?

root@localhost:~# fifo vms list
                                UUID hypervisor           alias      state
------------------------------------ -------------------- ---------- ---------------
1719e2fb-32a5-4784-b9ab-cb053ef4a392 smartosn1            ubuntu-12.04-test running
2aa40c28-1199-4dfa-9051-8b3b744dc233 smartosn2            megastore2 running
5d28ed86-2794-4909-9cbf-e97e362c749b smartosn2            be:gitlab  running
5daed30b-26b3-4717-ac02-dc2346020607 smartosn2            home-webserver running
5edc0bbc-312d-4893-8069-20874e430243 smartosn2            znc        running
62d6cb0a-0535-4549-9f81-19c48cec0163 smartosn1            onyxit-confluence running
82730c01-deb0-428b-8780-d90944fa2466 smartosn2            megastore  running
8833f427-1d11-4a00-8e36-790b09bb3fe9 smartosn1            pkgin-proxy running
89819a99-6692-4e32-9e10-c28e6aa3980a smartosn2            plex       running
9bfcde12-917f-4530-ad37-effa26666ca3 smartosn2            observium  running
a4a238fe-4bfe-4edc-8f0d-5d72158b718e smartosn1            2k8foundation running
b24a9b19-6da2-49eb-a823-750815172422 smartosn1            teamfortress stopped
eaf0f5a0-4956-4eff-a535-9f84980f92a5 smartosn2            pxeboot    stopped
f2facd4c-946d-4b65-a859-138274529ad2 smartosn1            dsapi-server running
f8bd1553-e010-4729-b5de-4dea260848c2 smartosn2            fifo-dev   running
fbae8217-e78e-4d3f-8dd9-af4599ab63fb smartosn2            minecraft-jdk7 running
fe55ed16-06bd-4c24-84c8-a68d3db75776 smartosn1            Request Tracker  running

Git clone method

Lets grab the files we will need by cloning the files directly from pyfi’s project page on github.

Run: git clone https://github.com/project-fifo/pyfi.git

macmini-mark:Downloads marks$ git clone https://github.com/project-fifo/pyfi.git
Cloning into 'pyfi'...
remote: Counting objects: 269, done.
remote: Compressing objects: 100% (127/127), done.
remote: Total 269 (delta 144), reused 242 (delta 118)
Receiving objects: 100% (269/269), 45.18 KiB, done.
Resolving deltas: 100% (144/144), done.
macmini-mark:Downloads marks$ cd pyfi/

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Now we install and configure it.

Run: python setup.py build build_scripts

macmini-mark:pyfi marks$ python setup.py build build_scripts
running build
running build_py
creating build
creating build/lib
creating build/lib/fifo
copying fifo/__init__.py -> build/lib/fifo
copying fifo/helper.py -> build/lib/fifo
creating build/lib/fifo/api
copying fifo/api/__init__.py -> build/lib/fifo/api
copying fifo/api/dataset.py -> build/lib/fifo/api
copying fifo/api/dtrace.py -> build/lib/fifo/api
copying fifo/api/group.py -> build/lib/fifo/api
copying fifo/api/hypervisor.py -> build/lib/fifo/api
copying fifo/api/iprange.py -> build/lib/fifo/api
copying fifo/api/network.py -> build/lib/fifo/api
copying fifo/api/package.py -> build/lib/fifo/api
copying fifo/api/user.py -> build/lib/fifo/api
copying fifo/api/vm.py -> build/lib/fifo/api
copying fifo/api/wiggle.py -> build/lib/fifo/api
running build_scripts
creating build/scripts-2.7
copying and adjusting bin/fifo -> build/scripts-2.7
changing mode of build/scripts-2.7/fifo from 644 to 755

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Then we run it and it will auto create a generic configuration file called .fifo in your home directory. This file is used so that you can authenticate with your fifo host without needing to supply authentication details and host you want to connect to via the command line every time. You then edit this file and put in your username, password and FiFo host ip. Once done you will need to call the client by using the full python path as shown below:

Run: PYTHONPATH=build/lib python build/scripts-2.7/fifo vms list

macmini-mark:pyfi marks$ PYTHONPATH=build/lib python build/scripts-2.7/fifo vms list
fifo client is not configured creating an example config at: /Users/marks/.fifo

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Ok, phew!, we have now covered quite extensively how to install the tool so lets move on to actually using it.

PyFi in practice

We will now demonstrate some use case examples. There are many ways to use the client but the most common will probably be to control your existing machines as well as deploying new ones.

Help Options
usage: fifo [-h] [--config CONFIG] [--host HOST] [--user USER]
            [--password PASSWORD] [--version]

            {hypervisors,vms,packages,datasets,networks,ipranges,dtrace,users,groups}
            ...

FiFo API client.

positional arguments:
  {hypervisors,vms,packages,datasets,networks,ipranges,dtrace,users,groups}
                        sub commands
    hypervisors         hypervisor related commands
    vms                 vm related commands
    packages            package related commands
    datasets            dataset related commands
    networks            network related commands
    ipranges            iprange related commands
    dtrace              dtrace related commands
    users               user related commands
    groups              group related commands

optional arguments:
  -h, --help                  show this help message and exit
  -c --config CONFIG          Selects the network config to use
  --host HOST                 The host to use (dns or ip no https://)
  -u --user USER              The user to log in with.
  -p --password PASSWORD      The password to log in with.
  --version                   show program's version number and exit

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