[chef] I think I'm doing it wrong: DNS as an example

[Brian Akins < >]

Let's take DNS (with route53) as an example:

Each node uses an LWRP (based on HW's route53 cookbook) to check
route53 and add itself to DNS if needed.  This seems like a common
patter and is all good.

However, what about when you have, say, 5000 nodes? It just seems
absolutely silly to have each node do this every hour. While it does
make sure that new nodes get added to DNS right away - it just seems
unnecessary to do this every chef run.

Now, imagine the above but with 3 or 4 services - API calls for
monitoring, load balancing, etc.  The "LWRP every chef run" is easy
and makes sense when you have a relatively few number of nodes.

How are other large installs handling this?

I was thinking that a script that once every x minutes scraped route53
and chef and just applied the "diff" would be more suitable for
"large" installs.

Or am I just fretting over nothing?

--Brian