Salt and managing .ssh/authorized_keys

Question

Salt has a state module to manage .ssh/authorized_keys

https://docs.saltstack.com/en/develop/ref/states/all/salt.states.ssh_auth.html

I am not happy with it, since it combines code and data.

The state file is for me some kind of source code.

The ssh-key is for me data.

I don't want to combine both in one file.

Is there an other solution which separates code and data?

Answer 1

you don't have to put them together in one file:

as per documentation: https://docs.saltstack.com/en/latest/ref/states/all/salt.states.ssh_auth.html you can use this method:

thatch:
  ssh_auth.present:
    - user: root
    - source: salt://ssh_keys/thatch.id_rsa.pub
    - config: /%h/.ssh/authorized_keys

(contrary to the example in the documentation, i get an error if the config: value starts with a '%')

this keeps your keys in their appropriate files and only links them from your code by their filenames.