[chef] Attribute Names

["Matthew Sims" < >]

I'm mostly curious how others handle this.

We have a chef environment where attribute can be located in three
places;the cookbook attributes, environments and roles (and in some cases,
in other cookbooks.)

Having to figure out where an attribute is set is occasionally frustrating
when I have to search in several places.

An idea proposed was the have the taxonomy of the attribute define where
it is being set.

Example:
['example']['attr']['value'] if set in the cookbook's attributes.
['example']['env']['value'] if set in the environments.
['example']['node']['value'] if set in the node.

I understand this breaks the precedence structure of attributes as we now
having unique attribute names based on location.

But having to find where the attribute is set can be a bit tedious.

I'm curious how others handle this. What method do you use so that looking
at an attribute in a cookbook, they know where to go find it rather than
search for it.

-- 
Matthew Sims