knife data bag¶
Data bags store global variables as JSON data. Data bags are indexed for searching and can be loaded by a cookbook or accessed during a search.
A data bag item may be encrypted using shared secret encryption. This allows each data bag item to store confidential information (such as a database password) or to be managed in a source control system (without plain-text data appearing in revision history). Each data bag item may be encrypted individually; if a data bag contains multiple encrypted data bag items, these data bag items are not required to share the same encryption keys.
Note
Because the contents of encrypted data bag items are not visible to the chef-server, search queries against data bags with encrypted items will not return any results.
Use the knife data bag
subcommand to manage arbitrary stores of globally available JSON data.
Note
Review the list of common options available to this (and all) knife subcommands and plugins.
create¶
Use the create
argument to add a data bag to the Chef server.
Syntax¶
This argument has the following syntax:
$ knife data bag create DATA_BAG_NAME [DATA_BAG_ITEM] (options)
Options¶
This argument has the following options:
DATA_BAG_ITEM
- The name of a specific item within a data bag.
DATA_BAG_NAME
may not beclient
,environment
,node
orrole
, as these are reserved words for knife search. --secret SECRET
- The encryption key that is used for values contained within a data bag item. If
secret
is not specified, the chef-client looks for a secret at the path specified by theencrypted_data_bag_secret
setting in the client.rb file. For encrypted data bag items, use either--secret
or--secret-file
, not both. --secret-file FILE
- The path to the file that contains the encryption key.
Note
See config.rb for more information about how to add certain knife options as settings in the config.rb file.
Examples¶
The following examples show how to use this knife subcommand:
Create a data bag
To create a data bag named “admins”, enter:
$ knife data bag create admins
to return:
Created data_bag[admins]
delete¶
Use the delete
argument to delete a data bag or a data bag item from a Chef server.
Syntax¶
This argument has the following syntax:
$ knife data bag delete DATA_BAG_NAME [DATA_BAG_ITEM] (options)
Options¶
This argument has the following options:
DATA_BAG_ITEM
- The name of a specific item within a data bag.
Examples¶
The following examples show how to use this knife subcommand:
Delete a data bag
$ knife data bag delete data_bag_name
Delete a data bag item
To delete an item named “charlie”, enter:
$ knife data bag delete admins charlie
Type Y
to confirm a deletion.
edit¶
Use the edit
argument to edit the data contained in a data bag. If encryption is being used, the data bag will be decrypted, the data will be made available in the $EDITOR, and then encrypted again before saving it to the Chef server.
Syntax¶
This argument has the following syntax:
$ knife data bag edit DATA_BAG_NAME [DATA_BAG_ITEM] (options)
Options¶
This argument has the following options:
DATA_BAG_ITEM
- The name of a specific item within a data bag.
--secret SECRET
- The encryption key that is used for values contained within a data bag item. If
secret
is not specified, the chef-client looks for a secret at the path specified by theencrypted_data_bag_secret
setting in the client.rb file. --secret-file FILE
- The path to the file that contains the encryption key.
Note
For encrypted data bag items, use either --secret
or --secret-file
, not both.
Note
See config.rb for more information about how to add certain knife options as settings in the config.rb file.
Examples¶
The following examples show how to use this knife subcommand:
Edit a data bag
To edit the contents of a data bag, enter:
$ knife data bag edit dogs tibetanspaniel
where dogs
is the name of the data bag and tibetanspaniel
is the name of the data bag item. This will return something similar to the following in the knife editor:
{
"name":"data_bag_item_dogs_tibetanspaniel",
"json_class":"Chef::DataBagItem",
"chef_type":"data_bag_item",
"data_bag":"dogs",
"raw_data":
{
"description":"small dog that likes to sit in windows",
"id":"tibetanspaniel"
}
}
Make the necessary changes to the key-value pairs under raw_data
and save them.
Edit a data bag item
To edit an item named “charlie” that is contained in a data bag named “admins”, enter:
$ knife data bag edit admins charlie
to open the $EDITOR. Once opened, you can update the data before saving it to the Chef server. For example, by changing:
{
"id": "charlie"
}
to:
{
"id": "charlie",
"uid": 1005,
"gid": "ops",
"shell": "/bin/zsh",
"comment": "Crazy Charlie"
}
from file¶
Use the from file
argument to:
- Add a data bag item to a data bag
- Update the contents of an existing data bag item
The data bag itself must already exist on the Chef server and must be specified as part of the command. The contents of the data bag item are specified using a JSON file. This JSON file may be located at a relative or absolute path; its location must be specified as part of the command. The JSON file that defines the contents of the data bag item must at least contain the name of the data bag item—"id": "name"
.
Warning
A chef-client must be version 11.6 (or higher) when using the knife data bag from file
argument with the Enterprise Chef or Open Source Chef version 11 servers.
Syntax¶
This argument has the following syntax:
$ knife data bag from file DATA_BAG_NAME_or_PATH JSON_FILE
Options¶
This argument has the following options:
-a
,--all
- Upload all data bags found at the specified path.
--secret SECRET
- The encryption key that is used for values contained within a data bag item. If
secret
is not specified, the chef-client looks for a secret at the path specified by theencrypted_data_bag_secret
setting in the client.rb file. --secret-file FILE
- The path to the file that contains the encryption key.
Note
For encrypted data bag items, use either --secret
or --secret-file
, not both.
Note
See config.rb for more information about how to add certain knife options as settings in the config.rb file.
Examples¶
The following examples show how to use this knife subcommand:
Create a data bag from a file
To create a data bag on the Chef server from a file:
$ knife data bag from file "path to JSON file"
Create an encrypted data bag from a file
To create a data bag named “devops_data” that contains encrypted data, enter:
$ knife data bag from file devops_data --secret-file "path to decryption file"
Create an encrypted data bag for use with chef-client local mode
To generate an encrypted data bag item in a JSON file for use when the chef-client is run in local mode (via the --local-mode
option), enter:
$ knife data bag from file my_data_bag /path/to/data_bag_item.json -z --secret-file /path/to/encrypted_data_bag_secret
this will create an encrypted JSON file in:
data_bags/my_data_bag/data_bag_item.json
list¶
Use the list
argument to view a list of data bags that are currently available on the Chef server.
Examples¶
The following examples show how to use this knife subcommand:
View a list of data bags
$ knife data bag list
show¶
Use the show
argument to view the contents of a data bag.
Options¶
This argument has the following options:
DATA_BAG_ITEM
- The name of a specific item within a data bag.
--secret SECRET
- The encryption key that is used for values contained within a data bag item. If
secret
is not specified, the chef-client looks for a secret at the path specified by theencrypted_data_bag_secret
setting in the client.rb file. --secret-file FILE
- The path to the file that contains the encryption key.
Note
For encrypted data bag items, use either --secret
or --secret-file
, not both.
Note
See config.rb for more information about how to add certain knife options as settings in the config.rb file.
Examples¶
The following examples show how to use this knife subcommand:
Show a data bag
$ knife data bag show admins
to return something like:
charlie
Show a data bag item
To show the contents of a specific item within data bag, enter:
$ knife data bag show admins charlie
to return:
comment: Crazy Charlie
gid: ops
id: charlie
shell: /bin/zsh
uid: 1005
Show a data bag, encrypted
To show the contents of a data bag named passwords
with an item that contains encrypted data named mysql
, enter:
$ knife data bag show passwords mysql
to return:
{
"id": "mysql",
"pass": "trywgFA6R70NO28PNhMpGhEvKBZuxouemnbnAUQsUyo=\n",
"user": "e/p+8WJYVHY9fHcEgAAReg==\n"
}
Show a data bag, decrypted
To show the decrypted contents of the same data bag, enter:
$ knife data bag show --secret-file /path/to/decryption/file passwords mysql
to return:
{
"id": "mysql",
"pass": "thesecret123",
"user": "fred"
}
Show a data bag as JSON
To view information in JSON format, use the -F
common option as part of the command like this:
$ knife data bag show admins -F json
Other formats available include text
, yaml
, and pp
.