Read from SaltStack pillar files

I've just installed a vanilla SaltStack master and minions. I'm trying to follow the instructions on https://docs.saltstack.com/en/latest/topics/development/conventions/formulas.html to create a very basic PHP state.

/srv/salt/php.sls:

php_ini:
  file.managed:
    - name: /etc/php.ini
    - source: salt://php.ini.tmpl
    - template: jinja
    - context:
        php_ini_settings: {{ salt.pillar.get('php_ini', {}) | json() }}

/srv/pillar/php.sls:

php_ini:
  PHP:
    engine: 'On'
    short_open_tag: 'Off'
    error_reporting: 'E_ALL & ~E_DEPRECATED & ~E_STRICT'

/srv/salt/php.ini.tmpl:

{% macro php_ini_serializer(data) %}
{% for section_name, name_val_pairs in data.items() %}
[{{ section_name }}]
{% for name, val in name_val_pairs.items() -%}
{{ name }} = "{{ val }}"
{% endfor %}
{% endfor %}
{% endmacro %}

; File managed by Salt at <{{ source }}>.
; Your changes will be overwritten.

{{ php_ini_serializer(php_ini_settings) }}

The output file looks like this:

VVV File starts on the next line


; File managed by Salt at <salt://php.ini.tmpl>.
; Your changes will be overwritten.



^^^ File ends on the previous line

I've added extra lines so that Stack Overflow will display the blank lines in the output file correctly.

I would expect it to look something link this:

VVV File starts on the next line


; File managed by Salt at <salt://php.ini.tmpl>.
; Your changes will be overwritten.

[PHP]
engine = "On"
short_open_tag = "Off"
error_reporting = "E_ALL & ~E_DEPRECATED & ~E_STRICT"


^^^ File ends on the previous line

It appears that Salt isn't reading the pillar file at all. What have I done wrong?

Solution

It looks like php_ini_settings: {{ salt.pillar.get('php_ini', {}) | json() }} does not add any data to the context of your jinja template salt://php.ini.tmpl.

To debug check if the pillar data is available use the pillar module

salt 'minionid' pilar.ls  # to check the existence of keys
salt 'minionid' pilar.items  # to explore whole the pillar data of your minion

Pillar data needs to be applied to minions like states using a top.sls file. My guess is that you did not apply your pillar data to your minion. Does /srv/pillar/top.sls includes somthing like that?

base:
  'minionid':
    - php