[badrogger]

This pull request introduces several improvements to the SKALE node provisioning and deployment system, focusing on enhanced preflight validation, better documentation, new utility scripts, and inventory template updates. The most significant changes are the addition of a comprehensive preflight check playbook, new Python utility scripts for source builds and passive node whitelisting, and updates to inventory templates to improve clarity and correctness.

Preflight validation and pipeline robustness:

• Added a new preflight.yaml playbook that validates inventory variables before running pipelines, ensuring missing or incorrect values are caught early and providing stage-specific checks for contracts, nodes, SGX, chains, and Fair deployments. Pipelines and node registration playbooks now import this preflight check at the start. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]

New utility scripts:

• Introduced compose_from_source.py, a Python script that rewrites a docker-compose.yml to build SKALE containers from local source repositories, supporting more flexible development workflows.
• Added whitelist_passive_skale.py, a utility to whitelist passive SKALE node IPs in the SyncManager, including logic to grant SYNC_MANAGER_ROLE if necessary.

Documentation improvements:

• Updated the README.md with detailed sections on upgrading OS packages, pipeline usage, passive node whitelisting, and the behavior of playbooks and utility scripts, making setup and maintenance procedures clearer. [1] [2] [3]

Inventory template and variable improvements:

• Updated the inventory template to clarify and correct variable names (docker_lvmpy_stream → docker_lvmpy_version, fixed typo in base_domain_name), set cleanup_sgx default to False, and fixed a typo in skale_watchdog_path. [1] [2] [3]

Dependency updates and minor fixes:

• Added ruamel.yaml to requirements.txt for YAML processing in utility scripts.
• Fixed minor bugs and improved error handling in utility scripts, such as correcting the logic in pack_subvolumes.py cleanup and making CHAIN_TYPE fallback logic more robust in create_chain.py. [1] [2] [3]

These changes collectively improve the reliability, maintainability, and developer experience of the SKALE node provisioning system.