knife-client(1)

NAME

knife-client - The man page for the knife client subcommand.

Every request made by the chef-client to the Chef server must be an authenticated request using the Chef server API and a private key. When the chef-client makes a request to the Chef server, the chef-client authenticates each request using a private key located in /etc/chef/client.pem.

However, during the first chef-client run, this private key does not exist. Instead, the chef-client will attempt to use the private key assigned to the chef-validator, located in /etc/chef/validation.pem. (If, for any reason, the chef-validator is unable to make an authenticated request to the Chef server, the initial chef-client run will fail.)

During the initial chef-client run, the chef-client will register with the Chef server using the private key assigned to the chef-validator, after which the chef-client will obtain a client.pem private key for all future authentication requests to the Chef server.

After the initial chef-client run has completed successfully, the chef-validator is no longer required and may be deleted from the node. Use the delete_validation recipe found in the chef-client cookbook (https://github.com/chef-cookbooks/chef-client) to remove the chef-validator.

The knife client subcommand is used to manage an API client list and their associated RSA public key-pairs. This allows authentication requests to be made to the Chef server by any entity that uses the Chef server API, such as the chef-client and knife.

COMMON OPTIONS

The following options may be used with any of the arguments available to the knife client subcommand:

BULK DELETE

The bulk delete argument is used to delete any API client that matches a pattern defined by a regular expression. The regular expression must be within quotes and not be surrounded by forward slashes (/).

Syntax

This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife client bulk delete REGEX

Options

This command does not have any specific options.

CREATE

The create argument is used to create a new API client. This process will generate an RSA key pair for the named API client. The public key will be stored on the Chef server and the private key will be displayed on STDOUT or written to a named file.

Syntax

This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife client create CLIENT_NAME (options)

Options

This argument has the following options:

Examples

To create a chef-client that can access the Chef server API as an administrator---sometimes referred to as an "API chef-client"---with the name "exampleorg" and save its private key to a file, enter:

$ knife client create exampleorg -a -f "/etc/chef/client.pem"

When running the create argument on Enterprise Chef, be sure to omit the -a option:

$ knife client create exampleorg -f "/etc/chef/client.pem"

DELETE

The delete argument is used to delete a registered API client.

Syntax

This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife client delete CLIENT_NAME

Options

This command does not have any specific options.

Examples

To delete a client with the name "client_foo", enter:

$ knife client delete client_foo

Type Y to confirm a deletion.

EDIT

The edit argument is used to edit the details of a registered API client. When this argument is run, knife will open $EDITOR to enable editing of the admin attribute. (None of the other attributes should be changed using this argument.) When finished, knife will update the Chef server with those changes.

Syntax

This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife client edit CLIENT_NAME

Options

This command does not have any specific options.

Examples

To edit a client with the name "exampleorg", enter:

$ knife client edit exampleorg

LIST

The list argument is used to view a list of registered API client.

Syntax

This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife client list (options)

Options

This argument has the following options:

Examples

To verify the API client list for the Chef server, enter:

$ knife client list

to return something similar to:

exampleorg
i-12345678
rs-123456

To verify that an API client can authenticate to the Chef server correctly, try getting a list of clients using -u and -k options to specify its name and private key:

$ knife client list -u ORGNAME -k .chef/ORGNAME.pem

REREGISTER

The reregister argument is used to regenerate an RSA key pair for an API client. The public key will be stored on the Chef server and the private key will be displayed on STDOUT or written to a named file.

NOTE:

Syntax

This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife client reregister CLIENT_NAME (options)

Options

This argument has the following options:

Examples

To regenerate the RSA key pair for a client named "testclient" and save it to a file named "rsa_key", enter:

$ knife client regenerate testclient -f rsa_key

SHOW

The show argument is used to show the details of an API client.

Syntax

This argument has the following syntax:

$ knife client show CLIENT_NAME (options)

Options

This argument has the following options:

Examples

To view a client named "testclient", enter:

$ knife client show testclient

to return something like:

admin:       false
chef_type:   client
json_class:  Chef::ApiClient
name:        testclient
public_key:

To view information in JSON format, use the -F common option as part of the command like this:

$ knife role show devops -F json

Other formats available include text, yaml, and pp.

AUTHOR

Chef