[chef] RE: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Is it possible to version control Chef Repository when working from management workstation?

["Sullivan, Jon Paul" < >]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: anatoly techtonik 
> [mailto:
 
> Sent: 05 July 2012 19:38
> To: 
> 
 
> Subject: [chef] Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Is it possible to version control
> Chef Repository when working from management workstation?
> 
> I see. In fact I don't mind if knife executed commands on server and
> had ability to sync (or download) Chef Repository. I could write a
> wrapper script to around that, but at least I know the limitations,
> which is huge advancement. Thanks for replies.

If you want to download from chef to a structure that can be placed into 
source control I found the knife download plugin from knife-essentials to be 
the best so far.

https://github.com/jkeiser/knife-essentials

It relies on your cookbook_path being set correctly.  I use the following in 
my knife.rb for setting my cookbook path so that it is always correct for 
whatever directory I am in on the local filesystem.

# Dynamically derive our cookbook directory from where we are in the 
filesystem
base = Dir.pwd
begin
    cb_path = nil
    Dir.foreach(base) do |dir|
        if dir.eql? "cookbooks"
            cb_path = "#{base}/#{dir}"
            break
        end
    end
    base = File.dirname(base)
end while base != "/" and cb_path.nil?
if cb_path.nil?
    cb_path = "~/cookbooks"
end
# Set the cookbook path
puts "Setting cookbook_path to #{cb_path}" if debug
cookbook_path cb_path if not cb_path.nil? and not cb_path.empty?

> 
> My ideal setup is like:
> 1. Install HG on server side and make Chef Server automatically save
> Chef Repository filesystem tree there
> 2. Every knife command triggers hg transaction(config change,
> pre-commit hook script to validate structure, save config to couch,
> commit with log message)
> 3. Backup script pulls Chef Repository into some storage and sends me
> commit notifications about all activities
> --
> anatoly t.
> 
> 
> On Thu, Jul 5, 2012 at 9:11 PM, Ranjib Dey 
> <
 >
> wrote:
> > yes. they are not very tightly integrated.
> > For you the truth is git repo, but for chef its couch and for knife
> its
> > couch or local file system (depending upon the operation). As you see,
> > people try to automate any one of the step , or practice certain
> > methpds/workflows to use git as the master , and rest are based on
> that.
> >
> > Chef is modular, if you want you can actually pull out the knife edit
> > options and enforce knife from file as the only way to push data, and
> > configure the system against a repo, where folks  can push changes.
> The only
> > gotcha is the delay introduced .
> >
> >
> >
> > On Thu, Jul 5, 2012 at 11:32 PM, anatoly techtonik
> <
 >
> > wrote:
> >>
> >> On Thu, Jul 5, 2012 at 8:10 PM, Joshua Miller 
> >> <
 >
> >> wrote:
> >> > The real problem in your example is to get away from commands like
> >> >
> >> > knife data bag edit
> >> > And
> >> > knife role edit
> >> >
> >> > Use the chef-repo example and have roles and data bags in there.
> Edit
> >> > the roles locally and then use standard source control options.
> When your
> >> > ready to push to the chef server use the from file commands.
> >> >
> >> > knife data bag from file users jmiller.json
> >> >
> >> > knife role from file base.json
> >> >
> >> > Hope that helps
> >>
> >> Not really. I am trying to set a workflow and so far it is not very
> >> satisfying as I hoped to manage my configuration as a source code. =)
> >> I've made a cookbook with:
> >>   knife cookbook create newcook
> >>
> >> It is created in my local cookbooks directory. I've committed it,
> then
> >> uploaded to server.
> >> Now I need to create data bag.
> >>   knife cookbook data bag create newbag
> >>
> >> There are no files to commit. Neither before nor after. Your advice
> >> basically mean that I manually need to keep layout in my local
> version
> >> equal to the one the server maintains? That means I need to know the
> >> layout and put .json file where it should belong on the server side.
> >>   knife data bag from file users ~/chef-repo/data-bags/jmiller.json
> >>
> >> That's not the version control I used to.
> >>
> >>
> >> I've also noticed that knife doesn't synchronize my local cookbooks
> >> with remote. When I do
> >>   knife download newcook
> >> it is not downloaded to my local cookbooks path - I have to specify
> >> the path manually. Why?
> >
> >
Thanks, 
Jon-Paul Sullivan ☺ Cloud Services - @hpcloud

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