With Hiera, you can externalize your systems’ configuration data and easily understand how those values are assigned to your servers. With that data separated from your Puppet code, you then can encrypt sensitive values, such as passwords and keys.
Separating code and data can be tricky. In the case of configuration management, there is significant value in being able to design a hierarchy of data—especially one with the ability to cascade through classifications of servers and assign one or several options. T