Configuration Management with Chef-Solo

By Naveed ur Rahman

This is a step-by-step guide, full of hands-on examples of real-world deployment tasks. Each topic is explained and placed in context, while also pointing out the key details of the concepts used.
This book is aimed at system administrators and system engineers who have an understanding of configuration management tools and infrastructure. For novice administrators, it contains easy-to-use application recipes to get started immediately.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Packt Publishing
• Release date: Jun 25, 2014
• ISBN: 9781783982479

Book preview

Table of Contents

Configuration Management with Chef-Solo

Credits

About the Author

About the Reviewers

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Preface

What this book covers

What you need for this book

Who this book is for

Conventions

Reader feedback

Customer support

Downloading the example code

Errata

Piracy

Questions

1. Introduction to Chef and Chef-Solo

Getting started with Chef

Understanding Chef-Solo

Terminologies

List of terminologies

Node

Workstation

Cookbooks

Recipes

Resources

Roles

Attributes

Templates

Data bags

Different use cases

PHP WordPress

Python/Django application

An overview of Chef

Summary

2. Setting Up an Environment for Chef-Solo

Installation on Linux and Ubuntu

Installing Chef as a Ruby gem

Installing Chef as a package manager

Using the Omnibus installer

Prerequisites of Chef-Solo

Cookbooks

The folder structure

Attributes

Files

Recipes

Templates

Downloading recipes

Chef-Solo configuration

Execution of recipes

Summary

3. Setting Up a Development Environment

Introducing virtual machine

System virtual machines

Process virtual machines

Executing recipes with Vagrant

Provision

Creating a Hello World recipe

Summary

4. Developing Cookbooks

Exploring Knife

Developing recipes and cookbooks

Berkshelf

The installation of Berkshelf

The creation of a Berksfile

Understanding recipes

Resources

Attributes

Metadata

Summary

5. More about Cookbooks and Recipes

Using files

Exploring templates

Data bags

Roles

Restarting services and server handling

Summary

6. Chef-Solo and Docker

Docker

Installing Docker

The working of Docker

Dockerfiles

Recommended ways to use Chef-Solo

Chef server

Web UI

Erchef

Message queues

Summary

Index

Configuration Management with Chef-Solo

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Configuration Management with Chef-Solo

Copyright © 2014 Packt Publishing

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.

Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy of the information presented. However, the information contained in this book is sold without warranty, either express or implied. Neither the author, nor Packt Publishing, and its dealers and distributors will be held liable for any damages caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by this book.

Packt Publishing has endeavored to provide trademark information about all of the companies and products mentioned in this book by the appropriate use of capitals. However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information.

First published: June 2014

Production reference: 1190614

Published by Packt Publishing Ltd.

Livery Place

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Birmingham B3 2PB, UK.

ISBN 978-1-78398-246-2

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Cover image by Béchir Charfi (<[e-mail]>)

Credits

Author

Naveed ur Rahman

Reviewers

Anirudh Bhatnagar

Stuart Ellis

Jorge Moratilla

Commissioning Editor

Edward Gordon

Acquisition Editor

Subho Gupta

Content Development Editor

Sriram Neelakantan

Technical Editors

Venu Manthena

Shruti Rawool

Copy Editors

Janbal Dharmaraj

Karuna Narayanan

Project Coordinator

Aboli Ambardekar

Proofreaders

Maria Gould

Paul Hindle

Indexer

Rekha Nair

Graphics

Disha Haria

Production Coordinator

Shantanu Zagade

Cover Work

Shantanu Zagade

About the Author

Naveed ur Rahman is a self-taught programmer and an avid traveler. When he is not experimenting with the latest in programming and deployment, he is out camping and watching cricket.

His adventures in programming began at a very young age when he got introduced to GW-BASIC. Now, he has experience working for one of the biggest tech names in the Middle East.

Having worked at the largest technology company in the Middle East, Naveed has helped teams create and deploy applications written in various languages using configuration management tools.

I would like to thank my family for supporting me throughout the process of writing. Also, the help of Packt Publishing staff has been incredible. I would like to thank my project coordinator and content development editor who supported me in writing and finalizing the content. Also, the technical reviewers provided me with a clear guideline to make this book more effective. Moreover, their valuable critiques allowed me to refine my work.

About the Reviewers

Anirudh Bhatnagar is a technology consultant with an extensive experience in Agile product development and consulting. He started his career working as a Java developer with product-based companies such as Adobe Systems, India, where most of his experience was in Java, J2EE, Spring, Hibernate, XML, Web Services, REST, CMS, SSO, ESB, and Liferay. Currently, he is working as a Principal Consultant in Xebia, India with specialization in Continuous Delivery methodology, and working on developing a PaaS for service orchestration using Mule ESB, ActiveMQ, Elasticsearch, Jenkins, Maven, Chef, and AWS. He has been contributing to the software community through his blogs, articles, projects, meetups, and conferences. Recently, he has started a DevOps community in New Delhi and has spoken at DevOpsDays India 2013.

Stuart Ellis works for a Ruby on Rails and mobile software development company, where he has many hats. In his current and previous roles, he has developed software with .NET and Ruby, written SQL in a surprising number of dialects, managed different combinations of Windows and Linux, and studied history.

Jorge Moratilla has a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science and has been working for Internet companies since 1998. He has been working as a contractor for companies such as Sun Microsystems and Oracle, working as a certified instructor and field engineer for several years. He has a large background working with technologies and products such as Linux, Solaris, LDAP, and Check Point. Recently, he has been working in development companies, mainly as a system administrator, and performing several tasks related with Agile management, testing, and Continuous Deployment. As a coordinator of the technical group Madrid DevOps, he promotes the adoption of a culture of continuous improvement in the enterprise. You can meet him at talks and hangouts he organizes in the community.

I would like to personally thank my wife Nuria and son Eduardo for being so understanding and supportive while I was reviewing this book. Also, I would like to thank my dear mom Milagros and dad Toñi, who put in all the effort to give me an education. Finally, I would thank also all those who have contributed to my personal and professional development through the years.

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