Anaconda Enterprise: Documentation

# Parcels, Management Packs, and Installers (AER 2.32)

Anaconda Repository provides a way to integrate with Cloudera Manager to distribute your Anaconda data science artifacts to your Hadoop cluster. You can create custom Cloudera Manager Parcels with the packages you want, including your own packages.

NOTE: Creating custom parcels requires a local mirror of the Anaconda packages. Anaconda Repository will not connect to `http://repo.continuum.io` to fetch packages that are not available locally. See the mirroring documentation.

To create a custom parcel, navigate to `/<username>/installers`. You can find this link in the dropdown menu, or in the Installers card on your homepage.

Now select the “Create new installer” button. You can create a new installer either by selecting packages or by selecting an environment already in your account.

Use only letters, numbers, dashes and underscores in the installer name.

When creating a parcel, Anaconda Repository generates a file named `construct.yaml` which can be used with conda constructor, and a 64-bit Linux installer including the specified packages.

To create just the installer script, click Create installer; to create a parcel, click Create parcel.

NOTE: By default, conda is not included in the custom parcel. If you wish to add additional packages to your environment, you can add those through the Anaconda Repository interface. If you wish to see the list of packages that are included in your custom parcel, the information is provided in `/opt/cloudera/parcels/<PARCEL_NAME>/meta/parcel.json`.

To create an installer by selecting packages:

1. Click the Create from Packages tab.
2. Enter the channels to fetch packages from into the Search for Channels box. Add each channel by clicking the green plus button next to the Search for Channels box. The `anaconda` user will be added by default.
3. Enter the package names into the Search for Packages box. Add each package by clicking the green plus button next to the Search for Packages box.
4. Set version requirements for each package with the drop down menus next to the package name.
5. Click the green Create management pack button or the green Create parcel button or the green Create installer button.

To create an installer from an environment:

1. Click the Create from Environment tab.
2. Enter the environment name and click the green check mark button.
3. Select the environment version from the drop-down menu next to the environment name.
4. Click the green Create management pack button or the green Create parcel button or the green Create installer button.

NOTE: The parcel is generated with the prefix of `/opt/cloudera/parcels/<PARCEL_NAME>`. This is the default location where activated parcels are loaded. If you are deploying parcels in a different directory, you can change this prefix with the `PARCELS_ROOT` configuration setting.

Once you have created a custom parcel, you can distribute it to your cluster by adding `http://<repository ip>:<port>/<username>/installers/parcels/` as a Remote Parcel Repository URL. Cloudera Manager will detect the parcels hosted on Anaconda Repository, and provide the option to Download and Distribute the parcels.

By default, Anaconda Repository generates a parcel file for every compatible distribution. You can customize which parcel distributions are created by configuring the `PARCEL_DISTRO_SUFFIXES` configuration setting.

NOTE: If you have configured `conda` via `~/.condarc` on your server for use of a proxy (for example, to mirror behind a proxy) you must disable proxying for the repository. See the conda documentation for more information.

For example:

    proxy_servers:
        https: http://proxy.corp.example.com
        http: http://proxy.corp.example.com
        'http://<repository ip>': false

Once you have an installer created, you can return to this page and create a management pack or a parcel from a specific version. Use the Create from a previous version option to choose which version you want to use. The Create Installer button will be disabled since you have already created an installer. The other buttons will be disabled if you have already created management packs or parcels for those versions.

The versions listed on the drop-down list are the versions that successfully created an installer. An installer is needed to create a management pack or a parcel, so versions which failed won’t be listed.