Server installation
and configuration
with Chef

Raimonds Simanovskis
TietoEnator Alise
@rsim github.com/rsim

Problem
• Manual system administration
• Non-repeatable
• No version control
• Takes too long

What is Chef?
Chef is
a state based,
declarative configuration
management engine.
You define recipes of how you
want your system to look and
then chef makes it so.

Chef
• Client-server architecture
• Embraces modern web technologies
• Best ideas from cfengine and Puppet
• Targeted to Linux, Solaris, Mac OS X
• Written in Ruby, recipes in Ruby

Architecture
Client
Chef Server
Chef Client
Ohai
Chef Indexer

Ohai
{
"kernel": {
"machine": "x86_64",
"name": "Linux",
"os": "GNU/Linux",
"version": "#1 SMP Wed Aug 20 21:08:51 UTC 2008",
"release": "2.6.24-19-xen"
},
"uptime_seconds": 12043422,
"platform_version": "8.04",
"platform": "ubuntu",
"virtualization": {
"role": "guest",
"emulator": "xen"
},
"os": "linux",
"idletime": "115 days 23 hours 34 minutes 06 seconds",
"idletime_seconds": 10020846,
"lsb": {
"id": "Ubuntu",
"description": ""Ubuntu 8.04.1"",
"codename": "hardy",
"release": "8.04"
},
"os_version": "2.6.24-19-xen"
}

Chef components
• Nodes • Attributes
• Cookbooks • Libraries
• Recipes • Files
• Definitions • Templates

Resources
cron execute directory
file group user
link package remote_directory
remote_file route script
service template http_request

Demo

Links
http://wiki.opscode.com/display/chef/Home
http://www.slideshare.net/
Orlando_Ruby_Users_Group/cooking-with-chef

Thanks!
http://blog.rayapps.com
http://github.com/rsim