splunk deployment server

[splunker_123]

Hi

I'm new to splunk ,thats why such a basic question

what is the use of deployment server in a splunk environment.when we should consider to set up a deployment server and client? All I know is to setup a full splunk instance- indexer/header at one machine and forwader at other machine where we need to monitor logs but what is the role of deployment server and client?

Any help is highly appreciated

Thanks

[sdaniels]

The deployment server will allow you to manage the configurations of all of the servers in your environment including search heads, indexers and forwarders. It is particularly useful for managing various groups of forwarders because you may have 100's or thousands of machines and manually configuring those would be extremely time consuming. The deployment server will allow you to push out those config files and make it very efficient. Note, is doesn't push out installation, patches etc....just the config files.

[Ayn]

The best thing would be to read the excellent docs section that covers this: http://docs.splunk.com/Documentation/Splunk/latest/Deploy/Aboutdeploymentserver