Fact file was parsed but returned an empty data set

Question

For my current module, I need to check if php version 5 or 7 is installed and created a fact for this. The fact file is stored in the modules directory in facts.d/packageversion.rb and has the following content:

#!/usr/bin/ruby
require 'facter'

Facter.add(:php_version) do
  setcode do
    if File.directory? '/etc/php5'
      5
    else
      if File.directory? '/etc/php7'
        7
      else
        0
      end
    end
  end
end

But I can't use it in my module. In Puppet agent log, i get this error:

Fact file /var/lib/puppet/facts.d/packageversion.rb was parsed but returned an empty data set

How can I solve this?

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Jun 21 '17 at 15:52

facts.d is the module directory for external facts. You could place this file into the external facts directory, but the expected output would need to be key-value pairs. This is not happening, so Puppet is not finding a data set for the fact. https://docs.puppet.com/facter/3.6/custom_facts.html#executable-facts-----unix

You have written this fact as a custom fact and not an external fact. Therefore, it needs to be placed inside the lib/facter directory in your module instead. Then it will function correctly. I notice this important information seems to have been removed from the latest Facter documentation, which probably lends to your confusion.

Also, consider using an elsif in your code for clarity and optimization:

if File.directory? '/etc/php5'
  5
elsif File.directory? '/etc/php7'
  7
else
  0
end

Using this logic, if you have both installed it only reports 5 — Mark Thomas, Jun 21 '17 at 18:01
Perfect, thank you! Didn't know that it's in the wrong directory. — Studentus, Jun 23 '17 at 11:53

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 21 '17 at 16:55

What Matt Schuchard said.

Also, you might consider that the Approved Vox Populi Puppet module uses this code for PHP version:

Facter.add(:phpversion) do
  setcode do
    output = Facter::Util::Resolution.exec('php -v')

    unless output.nil?
      output.split("\n").first.split(' ').
        select { |x| x =~ %r{^(?:(\d+)\.)(?:(\d+)\.)?(\*|\d+)} }.first
    end
  end
end

Note that Facter::Util::Resolution.exec is deprecated in favour of Facter::Core::Execution.exec.

Aside from that, you might consider this a better way of getting the PHP version.

Yeah I was about to say that I thought `Facter::Util::Resolution` was deprecated. Looks like the module needs an update. — Matthew Schuchard, Jun 21 '17 at 21:11

Fact file was parsed but returned an empty data set

2 Answers2