Functions take zero or more values as arguments and return a value.
Argument values need to be of the type and range as documented for each
function. Some functions are documented with a ...
, in which case they
take an arbitrary amount of arguments.
They can return scalar (string | int | real | bool), list (slist, ilist, rlist) and data values: |
[%CFEngine_include_example(function-return-types.cf)%]
Functions which return boolean
, technically return a string any
or !any
.
This is for compatibility with other functions and promise attributes which
expect class expressions.
Normally, you don’t need to worry about this, you use the function call to define classes, and use classes instead of boolean values:
bundle agent main
{
vars:
"five" int => "5";
classes:
"is_var" if => isvariable("five");
reports:
is_var::
"Success!";
}
There is no boolean data type for vars
promises.
If you want to store or print the class expression, you can use concat()
:
bundle agent main
{
vars:
"five" int => "5";
"expression" string => concat(isvariable("five"));
classes:
"is_var" if => "$(expression)"; # Will be expanded and evaluated
reports:
is_var::
"Success: expression expanded to '$(expression)' and evaluated to true!";
}
Note: the truth of a class expression or the result of a function call may change during evaluation, but typically, a class, once defined, will stay defined.
See also: [persistence in classes and decisions][Classes and Decisions#persistence]
Promise attributes which use a class expression (string) as input, like if
and unless
, can take a function call which returns string or boolean as well.
any
, which is always true, or !any
which is always false.bundle agent main
{
vars:
"five" int => "5";
"is_var_class_expression" string => concat(isvariable("$(five)"));
classes:
"five_less_than_seven" expression => islessthan("$(five)", 7);
"five_is_variable" if => "$(is_var_class_expression)";
reports:
any::
"five: $(five)";
"is_var_class_expression: $(is_var_class_expression)";
five_less_than_seven::
"$(five) is smaller than 7";
}
During convergence, CFEngine’s evaluation model will evaluate functions multiple times, which can be a performance concern.
Some system functions are particularly expensive:
execresult()
and returnszero()
for shell executionregldap()
, ldapvalue()
, and ldaplist()
for LDAP queriesfindprocesses()
, and processexists()
for querying processes.host2ip()
and ip2host()
for DNS queriesreadtcp()
for TCP interactionshubknowledge()
, and remotescalar()
for hub queriesWhen enabled cached functions are not executed on every pass of convergence. Instead, the function will only be executed once during the [agent evaluation step][Normal Ordering#Agent evaluation step] and its result will be cached until the end of that agent execution.
Note: Cached functions are executed multiple times during
[policy validation and pre-evaluation][Normal Ordering#cf-promises policy validation step].
Function caching is per-process, so results will not be cached between
separate components e.g. cf-agent
, cf-serverd
and cf-promises
.
Additionally functions are cached by hashing the function arguments. If you have
the exact same function call in two different promises (it does not matter if
they are in the same bundle or not) only the first executed function will be
cached. That cached result will be re-used for other identical function
occurrences.
Function caching can be disabled by setting cache_system_functions
in body
common control to false
.
If a variable passed to a function is unable to be resolved the function will be skipped. The function will be evaluated during a later pass when all variables passed as arguments are able to be resolved. The function will never be evaluated if any argument contains a variable that never resolves.
Some function arguments are marked as collecting which means they can “collect” an argument from various sources. The data is normalized into the JSON format internally, so all of the following data types have consistent behavior.
If a key inside a data container is specified (mycontainer[key]
),
the value under that key is collected. The key can be a string for
JSON objects or a number for JSON arrays.
If a single data container, CFEngine array, or slist is specified
(mycontainer
or myarray
or myslist
), the contents of it are
collected.
If a single data container, CFEngine array, or slist is specified
with @()
around it (@(mycontainer)
or @(myarray)
or
@(myslist)
), the contents of it are collected.
If a function call that returns a data container or slist is
specified, that function call is evaluated and the results are
inserted, so you can say for instance sort(data_expand(...), "lex")
to expand a data container then sort it.
If a list (slist, ilist, or rlist) is named, its entries are collected.
If any CFEngine “classic” array (array[key]
) is named, it’s first
converted to a JSON key-value map, then collected.
If a literal JSON string like [ 1,2,3 ]
or { "x": 500 }
is
provided, it will be parsed and used.
If any of the above-mentioned ways to reference variables are used
inside a literal JSON string they will be expanded (or the
function call will fail). This is similar to the behavior of
Javascript, for instance. For example, mergedata('[ thing, { "mykey": otherthing[123] } ]')
will wrap the thing
in a JSON array; then the contents of
otherthing[123]
will be wrapped in a JSON map which will also go in
the array.
Since CFEngine 3.10, some functions are marked as delayed evaluation which
means they can evaluate a function call across every element of a collection.
This makes intuitive sense for the collection traversing functions maparray()
,
maplist()
, and mapdata()
.
The practical use is for instance maplist(format("%03d", $(this)), mylist)
which will evaluate that format()
call once for every element of mylist
.
Before 3.10, the same call would have resulted in running the format()
function before the list is traversed, which is almost never what the user
wants.
There are a large number of functions built into CFEngine. The following tables might make it easier for you to find the function you need.
[%CFEngine_function_table()%]