Provided by: chef_12.14.60-3ubuntu1_all bug

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)