Training Agenda

Chef

Chef is a configuration management platform that defines infrastructure and application configuration as Ruby DSL code — cookbooks and recipes that are version-controlled, tested, and applied through a client-server model. It excels in large enterprise environments where declarative configuration needs to be composed, tested, and managed across thousands of nodes. This training covers Chef Infra from cookbook development through enterprise management with Chef Automate.

2 days On-site, remote, or hybrid Up to 20 participants German or English
What We Cover
Cookbooks, compliance, and fleet management
Day 1

Cookbook Development & Resources

  • Chef architecture: Chef Server, Chef Infra Client, Workstation, nodes — the client-server convergence model
  • Ruby DSL basics for Chef: Resources, providers, attributes, templates — the building blocks of Chef code
  • Writing cookbooks: Recipe structure, metadata.rb, Berksfile — laying out a well-organized cookbook
  • Core resources: package, service, template, file, directory, execute — the resources you'll use daily
  • Chef attributes: Precedence levels, node attributes, data bags — managing configuration data safely
  • Ohai: System facts and custom plugins — using node data in recipes and templates
  • Testing cookbooks locally with Chef Workstation: knife, chef commands — the local development loop
  • InSpec: Writing compliance tests for your cookbook that run in CI and production
Day 2

Roles, Environments & Chef Automate

  • Roles: Grouping recipes and attributes for node types — building a role hierarchy
  • Environments: Controlling cookbook versions per environment — dev, staging, production cookbook pinning
  • Policyfiles: Replacing roles/environments with immutable policy assignments — the modern approach
  • Berkshelf dependency management: Cookbook versioning and dependency resolution
  • Chef Supermarket: Consuming and wrapping community cookbooks safely
  • Chef Automate: Compliance scanning, convergence reporting, workflow — fleet-wide visibility
  • Knife: Node bootstrapping, data bag management, environment management
  • CI/CD for cookbooks: Test Kitchen, ChefSpec, GitHub Actions pipeline for cookbook validation
Learning Outcomes
What your team walks away with

Cookbook authors who can develop, test, and deploy Chef configuration at enterprise scale — from single-node development to fleet-wide Automate management.

Book the Chef training

Available standalone or combined with the Puppet or Ansible training for a configuration management comparison.

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