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https://github.com/jmitchell/vagrant-bootstrap


https://github.com/jmitchell/vagrant-bootstrap

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README 

        
# Vagrant Bootstrap



Vagrant Bootstrap is very much in progress, and doesn't offer any

value yet.



## The Vision



Lots of people have computers at their disposal, but the average user

isn't familiar with every platform's conventions. Even writing generic

instructions on how to determine a computer's local IP is

challenging. It's reminiscent of the pain when programming OS-specific

code.



```

#ifdef _WIN32

// blah, blah, blah

#endif



#ifdef linux

// this hurts; can I stop?

#endif

```



Vagrant Bootstrap will ease this pain by making it easy for any user

to set up Vagrant and its dependencies on their machine. Whenever the

user wants, she can install a new standardized VM (known as a

*world*). It will probably be a modern version of Linux with good

support for [Linux Containers](https://linuxcontainers.org/) and

[Docker](http://www.docker.com/), such as

[Ubuntu 14.04](http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop).



Each *world* serves as a consistent foundation for further

work. By themselves, worlds will be useful constructs for users who

want to learn more about computing via this standardized

platform. But there's room for more.



A *world* can have several *terroritories*. A *terrority* is a

semi-isolated environment such as a Linux Container, and it's hosted

on the *world* VM. There will be standard ways to specify and

implement territory specifications, possibly building on a

configuration management and remote execution framework such as

[Salt Stack](http://www.saltstack.com/). Knowledgeable computer users

will be able to implement specifications for the territories that

should exist in a world and how they may or may not communicate with

each other. Since these territory specifications all target the same

world platform, there's little concern about cross-platform

programming or strange variation in end-user

documentation. Additionally, user-friendly tooling will make it easy

for users to populate their new *worlds* with territories based on a

specification code repository.



## Getting there



The initial hurdle is identifying the latest stable Vagrant code to

download. For months the Vagrant project has diligently updated

[version.txt](https://github.com/mitchellh/vagrant/blob/master/version.txt)

and tagged each release. Additionally, OS-specific code will be

required to install Vagrant and its dependencies, ideally in some

sandbox to prevent collisions with existing or future installations.



One of the most critical dependencies is a

[provider](http://docs.vagrantup.com/v2/providers/index.html). For

this project [VirtualBox](virtualbox.org) will serve as the default

provider as it runs on a wide variety of operating systems and can be

installed free of charge.