Debian – Automate dpkg-reconfigure tzdata

debconfdebiandpkgpuppettimezone

I'm using puppet to admin a cluster of debian servers. I need to change the timezone of each machine on the cluster. The proper debian way to do this is to use dpkg-reconfigure tzdata. But I can only seem to change it if I use the dialog. Is there some way to automate this from the shell so I can just write an Exec to make this easy?

If not, I think the next best way would probably be to have puppet distribute /etc/timezone and /etc/localtime with the correct data across the cluster.

Any input appreciated!

Best Answer

You need to specify the frontend as `noninteractive' and it will save your current settings.

dpkg-reconfigure will take the current system settings as gospel, so simply change your timezone the way you would normally and run it with the non-interactive flag

e.g. for me to change to "Europe/Dublin" where I am:

# echo "Europe/Dublin" > /etc/timezone    
# dpkg-reconfigure -f noninteractive tzdata

Obviously this allows you to use puppet/cfengine as you like to distribute /etc/timezone also.

EDIT:

after @gertvdijk comment pointing to https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/tzdata/+bug/1554806 and @scruss answer you will probably have to do it like this in most modern distributions:

$ sudo ln -fs /usr/share/zoneinfo/Europe/Dublin /etc/localtime
$ sudo dpkg-reconfigure -f noninteractive tzdata
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