I use puppet to install a current JDK and tomcat.

package {
    [ "openjdk-6-jdk", "openjdk-6-doc", "openjdk-6-jre",
      "tomcat6", "tomcat6-admin", "tomcat6-common", "tomcat6-docs", 
      "tomcat6-user" ]:
    ensure =&gt; present,
}


Now I'd like to add 

JAVA_HOME="/usr/lib/java"
export JAVA_HOME


to /etc/profile, just to get this out of the way. I haven't found a straightforward answer in the docs, yet. Is there a recommended way to do this?

In general, how do I tell puppet to place this file there or modify that file? I'm using puppet for a single node (in standalone mode) just to try it out and to keep a log of the server setup.


Question: How do you say x in x language? What's the English/Spanish word for x?
Answer: As Kristina says, what's the word for... asks for a specific word, while how do you say... could be a word or a phrase.

Both ways are perfectly fine and idiomatic. A pedant myself, the argument "how asks for an adverb of manner" sounds like a joke to me, wordplay, not something one would say in all seriousness. You can express a "manner" in more ways than just by a single adverb; a sequence of sounds (like a phrase) is a manner or way to express a thought, a way of saying something.