ensure => latest results in resource change on every run

[bodgit]

I have the following in a manifest:

rvm_gem { 'bosh_cli_plugin_micro':
    ensure       => 'latest',
    ruby_version => 'ruby-2.0',
    require      =>  Rvm_system_ruby['ruby-2.0'],
}

gem list on a host currently returns:

...
bosh_cli_plugin_micro (1.2707.0, 1.2697.0, 1.2693.0, 1.2690.0, 1.2686.0, 1.2685.0, 1.2682.0, 1.2671.0, 1.2640.0, 1.2624.0, 1.2619.0, 1.2611.0, 1.2579.0)
...

On every Puppet run, I get the following logged:

Notice: /Stage[main]/.../Rvm_gem[bosh_cli_plugin_micro]/ensure: ensure changed '1.2707.01.2697.01.2693.01.2690.01.2686.01.2685.01.2682.01.2671.01.2640.01.2624.01.2619.01.2611.01.2579.0' to 'latest'

It looks like ensure => latest doesn't correctly realise this is a no-op when the latest version (1.2707.0 presumably) is contained in the concatenated string of versions already installed.

Can anything be done to make this smarter?

[chrisleavoy]

I ran into this as well. I changed ensure => latest to ensure => present and it started working properly. Is this typical?

[holstvoogd]

@chrisleavoy there is a difference: latest installs the newest version available if it is not yet installed, present installs the latest version on the first run and then never installs a new version as long as there is any version installed.

I'm looking at creating a PR for this, my idea is to simply ensure it only reports a change if a new version was installed. Otherwise nothing is reported.

[TJM]

The only time I ever hard coded my version was to get around that little GPG issue :) ... Otherwise I usually leave it as "present" as well. Setting ensure -> latest just seems like it is asking for trouble. :)

[carlossg]

fixed in #115