Using Stencil Groups

How to define a StencilGroup

To define a StencilGroup click on the New Group button on the Formation detail page. This will open a form with three fields: Name, Tags and Rules.

Name and Tags should be self explanatory. Rules are JSON objects that determine what's included in or excluded from your StencilGroup. For example the following rule, includes any Stencil named setup.yml in this group:

	{
		"include" : ["name:setup.yml"]
	}

...while the following rule includes any Stencil with the production tag in the group:

	{
		"include" : ["tag:production"]
	}

More about StencilGroup rules

Each StencilGroup JSON object (rule) must start with one of two possible keys: "include" or "exclude". Each object (rule) is a JSON array of strings, each selecting Stencils by name or tag.

To select Stencils by name use the name:foo.yml format and to select Stencils by tag, use the tag:foo format. Selectors can be used together (as ANDs) separated by commas: ["name:foo.yml", "name:bar.yml", "tag:fuzz", "tag:buzz"]

If both include and exclude keys exist, the list of Stencils is selected by first applying the include selectors and then removing the exclude ones.

Here is an example of a complete StencilGroup rule:

	{
		"include" : ["name:setup.yml", "tag:config"],
		"exclude" : ["tag:test", "tag:qa", "name:deployment.yml"]
	}

As you can see, this includes the base set up for the application along with all its configurations, but excludes all the components tagged as "test" and "qa" as well as the Kubernetes Deployment definition.

Rendering StencilGroups

After you have defined a StencilGroup, you can click on the cog icon for that group at the top of the Formation detail page, and then click "Render group".

Once you have rendered the group you can apply it to your Kubernetes cluster(s) as needed by either downloading the stencils or by using Cloud 66 Toolbelt.