[chef] Re: Re: Re: Auto scaling with chef questions

[Bryan Brandau < >]

I'd suggest using instance ID's as it's the main unique value you'll get from AWS.  On instance deregistration send a message to SQS.  Have a process on some stable node (the chef server?) that polls SQS and then removes the node and client from the chef server.

I don't like passing in user data.  We did that originally and it turned out to be something we regretted and migrated away from.  As Jeff pointed out, use the first-run.json.  Have a different AMI for each server role type.  Save yourself even potential future issues by fully baking the AMI with everything on it.  In run-state you'll still use chef but as the enforcer of the state. If you have a critical service, you'll be thankful at some point in time that you have fully baked AMI's if you want to scale.  If you're chef server fails, an external dependency fails or misc failure happens you wouldn't be able to scale.  Depending on how long your chef run is you'll also save yourself lots of time waiting for nodes to come up when you need them the most (you're scaling up for a reason).

Bryan

@agent462

Sr Manager of Operations, bestbuy.com

On Sun, Dec 9, 2012 at 3:05 PM, Hector Castro < " target="_blank"> > wrote:

Right now, we are using customized user data via the AS launch
configuration to insert instance IDs (collected from EC2's internal
metadata service) into the Chef node name.

--
Hector

On Fri, Dec 7, 2012 at 7:00 PM, Jeffrey Hulten < "> > wrote:
> In autoscaling groups you set a launch config which can contain a first-run.json that you can include to the chef-client.
>
> { "run_list" : "role[my_service]" }
>
> chef-client -j /etc/chef/first-run.json
>
> --
> Jeffrey Hulten
> Principal Consultant at Automated Labs, LLC
> ">  206-853-5216
> Skype: jeffhulten
>
> On Dec 7, 2012, at 3:50 PM, Cassiano Leal wrote:
>
>> I had been thinking about the very same thing for a while, but haven't had the time to run some tests.
>>
>> My guess so far is that every new machine that spins up will run chef-client, create a node and a client using the validator key and using the ec2-****** FQDN as client/node name. Have you tried running 'hostname -f' on an EC2 server?
>>
>> --
>> Cassiano Leal
>>
>> On Friday, December 7, 2012 at 21:43, Bridger Larson wrote:
>>
>>> The company I am working for is moving to AWS.  I want to be able to have Chef pre-installed on our application server AMI’s so when they start up they will be configured correctly.
>>>
>>> If one AMI can create many servers, how does the Chef client give them different client names?
>>> How does Chef know to remove them when the server is deleted?
>>>
>>> Thanks!
>>> Bridger Larson
>>
>