NAME

       knife - The man page for the knife command line tool.

       knife  is  a  command-line tool that provides an interface between a local chef-repo and the Chef server.
       knife helps users to manage:

       • Nodes

       • Cookbooks and recipes

       • Roles

       • Stores of JSON data (data bags), including encrypted data

       • Environments

       • Cloud resources, including provisioning

       • The installation of the chef-client on management workstations

       • Searching of indexed data on the Chef server

       Knife subcommands:

       • knife bootstrap

       • knife client

       • knife configure

       • knife cookbook

       • knife cookbook site

       • knife data bag

       • knife delete

       • knife deps

       • knife diff

       • knife download

       • knife edit

       • knife environment

       • knife exec

       • knife list

       • knife node

       • knife raw

       • knife recipe list

       • knife role

       • knife search

       • knife show

       • knife ssh

       • knife status

       • knife tag

       • knife upload

       • knife user

       • knife xargs

WORKING WITH KNIFE

       knife runs from a management workstation  and  sits  in-between  a  Chef  server  and  an  organization's
       infrastructure.  knife  interacts  with  a  Chef  server  by  using  the  same REST API that is used by a
       chef-client. Role-based authentication controls (RBAC) can be used to authorize changes when knife is run
       with  Enterprise  Chef. knife is configured during workstation setup, but subsequent modifications can be
       made using the knife.rb configuration file.

   Common Options
       The following options can be run with all knife sub-commands and plug-ins:

       -c CONFIG_FILE, --config CONFIG_FILE
              The configuration file to use. For example, when knife is run from a node that is configured to be
              managed  by the Chef server, this option is used to allow knife to use the same credentials as the
              chef-client when communicating with the Chef server.

       --chef-zero-port PORT
              The port on which chef-zero will listen.

       -d, --disable-editing
              Use to prevent the $EDITOR from being opened and to accept data as-is.

       --defaults
              Use to have knife use the default value instead of asking a user to provide one.

       -e EDITOR, --editor EDITOR
              The $EDITOR that is used for all interactive commands.

       -E ENVIRONMENT, --environment ENVIRONMENT
              The name of the environment. When this option is added to a command, the  command  will  run  only
              against  the  named environment. This option is ignored during search queries made using the knife
              search subcommand.

       -F FORMAT, --format FORMAT
              The output format: summary (default), text, json, yaml, and pp.

       -h, --help
              Shows help for the command.

       -k KEY, --key KEY
              The private key that knife will use to sign requests made by the API client to the Chef server.

       --[no-]color
              Use to view colored output.

       --print-after
              Use to show data after a destructive operation.

       -s URL, --server-url URL
              The URL for the Chef server.

       -u USER, --user USER
              The user name used by knife to  sign  requests  made  by  the  API  client  to  the  Chef  server.
              Authentication will fail if the user name does not match the private key.

       -v, --version
              The version of the chef-client.

       -V, --verbose
              Set for more verbose outputs. Use -VV for maximum verbosity.

       -y, --yes
              Use to respond to all confirmation prompts with "Yes". knife will not ask for confirmation.

       -z, --local-mode
              Use  to  run  the  chef-client  in local mode. This allows all commands that work against the Chef
              server to also work against the local chef-repo.

   JSON Data Format
       Most data is entered using a text editor in JSON format, unless the --disable-editing option  is  entered
       as  part  of  a  command.  (Encrypted data bags use YAML, which is a superset of JSON.) JSON is a common,
       language-independent data format that provides a simple text representation of arbitrary data structures.
       For more information about JSON, see http://www.json.org/ or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JSON.

   Set the Text Editor
       Some knife commands, such as knife data bag edit, require that information be edited as JSON data using a
       text editor. For example, the following command:

          $ knife data bag edit admins admin_name

       will open up the text editor with data similar to:

          {
            "id": "admin_name"
          }

       Changes to that file can then be made:

          {
            "id": "Justin C."
            "description": "I am passing the time by letting time pass over me ..."
          }

       The type of text editor that is used by knife can be configured by adding an entry to the  knife.rb  file
       or  by  setting  an EDITOR environment variable. For example, to configure the text editor to always open
       with vim, add the following to the knife.rb file:

          knife[:editor] = "/usr/bin/vim"

       When a Microsoft Windows file path is enclosed in a  double-quoted  string  ("  "),  the  same  backslash
       character  (\)  that  is  used to define the file path separator is also used in Ruby to define an escape
       character. The knife.rb file is a Ruby  file;  therefore,  file  path  separators  must  be  escaped.  In
       addition,  spaces in the file path must be replaced with ~1 so that the length of each section within the
       file path is not more than 8 characters. For example, if EditPad Pro is the text editor of choice and  is
       located at the following path:

          C:\\Program Files (x86)\EditPad Pro\EditPad.exe

       the setting in the knife.rb file would be similar to:

          knife[:editor] = "C:\\Progra~1\\EditPa~1\\EditPad.exe"

       One  approach to working around the double- vs. single-quote issue is to put the single-quotes outside of
       the double-quotes. For example, for Notepad++:

          knife[:editor] = '"C:\Program Files (x86)\Notepad++\notepad++.exe -nosession -multiInst"'

       for Sublime Text:

          knife[:editor] = '"C:\Program Files\Sublime Text 2\sublime_text.exe --wait"'

       for TextPad:

          knife[:editor] = '"C:\Program Files (x86)\TextPad 7\TextPad.exe"'

       and for vim:

          knife[:editor] = '"C:\Program Files (x86)\vim\vim74\gvim.exe"'

   Using Quotes
       Values can be entered with double quotes ("  ")  or  single  quotes  ('  '),  but  this  should  be  done
       consistently.

   Sub-commands
       knife  comes  with  a  collection  of  built  in  subcommands  that  work  together to provide all of the
       functionality required to take  specific  actions  against  any  object  in  an  organization,  including
       cookbooks,  nodes,  roles,  data  bags, environments, and users. A knife plugin extends the functionality
       beyond built-in subcommands.

       knife has the following subcommands: bootstrap, client, configure, cookbook,  cookbook  site,  data  bag,
       delete,  deps,  diff,  download,  edit,  environment, exec, index rebuild, list, node, recipe list, role,
       search, show, ssh, status, tag, upload, user, and xargs.

       NOTE:
          The following subcommands run only against the open source Chef server: index rebuild and user.

   Syntax
       All knife subcommands have the following syntax:
          knife subcommand [ARGUMENT] (options)

       Each subcommand has its own set of arguments and options.

       NOTE:
          All syntax examples in this document show variables in  ALL_CAPS.  For  example  -u  PORT_LIST  (where
          PORT_LIST  is  a  comma-separated  list  of  local  and  public  UDP ports) or -F FORMAT (where FORMAT
          determines the output format, either summary, text, json, yaml, or pp). These variables often  require
          specific values that are unique to each organization.

AUTHOR

       Chef

                                                    Chef 12.0                                           KNIFE(1)