What is the Chef Server? and Full details about Chef Server?

Chef Server

• Chef server is going to be a hub for the code(Cookbooks)
• Nodes pull code(Cookbooks) from chef-server
• Sign up for chef-server account
• Attach your workstation to chef-server
• Upload cookbooks to server
• Bootstrap nodes
• Apply cookbooks to nodes

Getting started with Chef Server

• Sign up in https://manage.chef.io
• Get verification email. So get verified.
• Create a new organization
• Give full name
• Give short name (Must be Unique) (we get URL on this short name)
• Now you can see the dashboard.
• To establish communication b/w Chef Server & Workstation
• Go to
• Administration
• Organization
• Download starter kit
• Unzip it. You can see chef-repo
• Move chef-repo to chef workstation (under ec2-user directory)(by using WinSCP Tool)
• See the components of chef-repo
• To verify whether communication established or not (be inside chef-repo)
• knife SSL check

Bootstrap a node

• Attaching a node to chef-server is called Bootstrapping (Make sure, both workstation
& node are in same AZ)
• Now onwards, you have to be inside the chef-repo directory to run any command.
• Two actions will be done while bootstrapping

• Adding node to chef server
• Installing chef package
(copy .pem key of node into chef-repo folder in workstation)
knife bootstrap <node-private-IP> --ssh-user ec2-user --sudo -i <.pem> -N <any-node-name(avoid hyphens in node
name)>

• Bootstrap 2 nodes
• To see bootstrapped nodes

knife node list