[chef] Re: What is file_backup_path?

[Brandon Raabe < >]

When Chef makes changes to the file system, the files that are changed are backed up by default. That location is where this backup is stored. They are there as a fail-safe, in case the changes that were put in place were made in error. This allows you to recover the previous version of the file. 

I've not had the backup cache fill up on me before, but you can tune the number of backups that are kept per resource. I don't see a way to configure a backup count globally, but it can be limited on individual resources using the backup attribute. By default the backup count is set to 5.

File 

https://docs.chef.io/resource_file.html#attributes

Remote File 

https://docs.chef.io/resource_remote_file.html#attributes

Cookbook File 

https://docs.chef.io/resource_cookbook_file.html#attributes

Template 

https://docs.chef.io/resource_template.html#attributes

There may be others I've missed.

Thanks,

Brandon

On Tue, Apr 28, 2015 at 7:09 PM, Greg Barker < " target="_blank"> > wrote:

I noticed the /var/chef/backup folder was getting kinda big. The docs had this to say about file_backup_path:

The location in which backup files are stored. If this value is empty, backup files will be stored in the directory of the target file. Default value: /var/chef/backup.

What exactly goes in there and why? Do I need to be cleaning it out every now and then?

Greg