Getting started with MCollective has always been an adventure, you have to learn a ton of new stuff like Middleware etc. And once you get that going the docs tend to present you with a vast array of options and choices including such arcane topics like which security plugin to use while the security model chosen is entirely unique to mcollective. To get a true feeling for the horror see the official deployment guide .

This is not really a pleasant experience and probably results in many insecure or half build deployments out there – and most people just not bothering. This is of course entirely my fault, too many options with bad defaults chosen is to blame.

I saw the graph of the learning curve of Eve Online and immediately always think of mcollective