NAME¶

knife-cookbook - The man page for the knife cookbook subcommand. A cookbook is the fundamental unit of configuration and policy distribution. Each cookbook defines a scenario, such as everything needed to install and configure MySQL, and then it contains all of the components that are required to support that scenario, including:
The knife cookbook subcommand is used to interact with cookbooks that are located on the server or the local chef-repo.

COMMON OPTIONS¶

The following options may be used with any of the arguments available to the knife cookbook subcommand:

BULK DELETE¶

The bulk delete argument is used to delete cookbook files that match a pattern defined by a regular expression. The regular expression must be within quotes and not be surrounded by forward slashes (/). Syntax This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife cookbook bulk delete REGEX (options)

Options This argument has the following options:
Examples Use a regular expression to define the pattern used to bulk delete cookbooks:

$ knife cookbook bulk delete "^[0-9]{3}$" -p

CREATE¶

The create argument is used to create a new cookbook directory on the local machine, including the following directories and files:
After the cookbook is created, it can be uploaded to the server using the knife upload argument. Syntax This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife cookbook create COOKBOOK_NAME (options)

Options This argument has the following options:
Examples To create a cookbook named "my_cookbook" with copyright, email, license, and readme format options specified, enter:

$ knife cookbook create my_cookbook -C "My Name" -m "my@email.com" -I apachev2 -r md

to return something like:

** Creating cookbook my_cookbook
** Creating README for cookbook: my_cookbook
** Creating metadata for cookbook: my_cookbook

DELETE¶

The delete argument is used to delete a specified cookbook or cookbook version on the server (and not locally). Syntax This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife cookbook delete COOKBOOK_NAME [COOKBOOK_VERSION] (options)

Options This argument has the following options:
Examples

$ knife cookbook delete cookbook_name version

For example:

$ knife cookbook delete smartmon 0.8

Type Y to confirm a deletion.

DOWNLOAD¶

The download argument is used to download a cookbook from the server to the current working directory. Syntax This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife cookbook download COOKBOOK_NAME [COOKBOOK_VERSION] (options)

Options This argument has the following options:
Examples To download a cookbook named "smartmon", enter:

$ knife cookbook download smartmon

LIST¶

The list argument is used to view a list of cookbooks that are currently available on the server. The list will contain only the most recent version for each cookbook by default. Syntax This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife cookbook list (options)

Options This argument has the following options:
Examples To view a list of cookbooks:

$ knife cookbook list

METADATA¶

The metadata argument is used to generate the metadata for one or more cookbooks. Syntax This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife cookbook metadata (options)

Options This argument has the following options:
Examples

$ knife cookbook metadata -a

METADATA FROM FILE¶

The metadata from file argument is used to load the metadata for a cookbook from a file. Syntax This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife cookbook metadata from file FILE

Options This command does not have any specific options. Examples

$ knife cookbook metadta from file /path/to/file

SHOW¶

The show argument is used to view information about a cookbook, parts of a cookbook (attributes, definitions, files, libraries, providers, recipes, resources, and templates), or a file that is associated with a cookbook (including attributes such as checksum or specificity). Syntax This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife cookbook show COOKBOOK_NAME [COOKBOOK_VERSION] [PART...] [FILE_NAME] (options)

Options This argument has the following options:
Examples To get the list of available versions of a cookbook named "getting-started", enter:

$ knife cookbook show getting-started

to return something like:

getting-started   0.3.0  0.2.0

To show a list of data about a cookbook using the name of the cookbook and the version, enter:

$ knife cookbook show getting-started 0.3.0

to return something like:

attributes:
  checksum:     fa0fc4abf3f6787aeb5c3c5c35de667c
  name:         default.rb
  path:         attributes/default.rb
  specificity:  default
  url:          https://somelongurlhere.com
chef_type:      cookbook_version
cookbook_name:  getting-started
definitions:    []
files:          []
frozen?:        false
json_class:     Chef::CookbookVersion
libraries:      []

To only view data about "templates", enter:

$ knife cookbook show getting-started 0.3.0 templates

to return something like:

checksum:     a29d6f254577b830091f140c3a78b1fe
name:         chef-getting-started.txt.erb
path:         templates/default/chef-getting-started.txt.erb
specificity:  default
url:          https://someurlhere.com

To view information in JSON format, use the -F common option as part of the command like this:

$ knife role show devops -F json

Other formats available include text, yaml, and pp.

TEST¶

The test argument is used to test a cookbook for syntax errors. This argument uses Ruby syntax checking to verify every file in a cookbook that ends in .rb and Embedded Ruby (ERB). Syntax This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife cookbook test COOKBOOK_NAME (options)

Options This argument has the following options:
Examples

$ knife cookbook test cookbook_name

UPLOAD¶

The upload argument is used to upload one or more cookbooks (and any files that are associated with those cookbooks) from a local repository to the server. Only files that do not already exist on the server will be uploaded.

Note

Use a chefignore file to prevent the upload of specific files and file types, such as temporary files or files placed in folders by version control systems. The chefignore file must be located in the root of the cookbook repository and must use rules similar to filename globbing (as defined by the Ruby File.fnmatch syntax).

Syntax This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife cookbook upload [COOKBOOK_NAME...] (options)

Options This argument has the following options:
Examples

$ knife cookbook upload cookbook_name

To upload a cookbook, and then prevent other users from being able to make changes to it, enter:

$ knife cookbook upload redis --freeze

to return something like:

Uploading redis...
Upload completed

If a cookbook is frozen and the --force option is not specified, Knife will return an error message similar to the following:

Uploading redis...
ERROR: Version 0.1.6 of cookbook redis is frozen. Use --force to override.

AUTHOR¶

Chef