A Knife plugin to set node environment

set_environment.rb

## Knife plugin to set node environment
# See http://wiki.opscode.com/display/chef/Environments
#
## Install
# Place in .chef/plugins/knife/set_environment.rb
#
## Usage
# Nick-Stielaus-MacBook-Pro:chef-repo nstielau$ knife node set_environment mynode.net my_env
# Looking for mynode.net
# Setting environment to my_env
# 1 items found
# 
# Node Name:   mynode.net
# Environment: my_env
# FQDN:        mynode.net
# IP:          66.111.39.46
# Run List:    role[base], role[web_app]
# Roles:       base, web_app
# Recipes      timezone::default, hosts::default, sudo::default, web_app::default
# Platform:    ubuntu 10.04


require 'chef/knife'

module SomeNamespace
  class NodeSetEnvironment < Chef::Knife

    deps do
      require 'chef/search/query'
      require 'chef/knife/search'
    end

    banner "knife node set_environment NODE ENVIRONMENT"

    def run
      unless @node_name = name_args[0]
        ui.error "You need to specify a node"
        exit 1
      end

      unless @environment = name_args[1]
        ui.error "You need to specify an environment"
        exit 1
      end

      puts "Looking for #{@node_name}"

      searcher = Chef::Search::Query.new
      result = searcher.search(:node, "name:#{@node_name}")

      knife_search = Chef::Knife::Search.new
      node = result.first.first
      if node.nil?
        puts "Could not find a node named #{@node_name}"
        exit 1
      end

      puts "Setting environment to #{@environment}"
      node.chef_environment(@environment)
      node.save

      knife_search = Chef::Knife::Search.new
      knife_search.name_args = ['node', "name:#{@node_name}"]
      knife_search.run

    end
  end
end

I think anybody who uses knife should be careful :) The validation should be on higher layers, not in knife. Knife really is just a command-line tool to directly interact with the chef server. It's a little bit like a doctor cutting open a patient - and there should be no limits at all on the knife.

In practice, I never misspelled an environment, but I often forgot to set any environment at all. So for everything that is related to production, I have a CLI layer on top of knife. That is where the actual validation should take place (otherwise you won't be able to keep this gist reusable).

The above plugin fails with chef 11.0.0 on the last step of searching for and displaying the node info due to missing config[:rows] and config[:start] parameters in /opt/chef/embedded/lib/ruby/gems/1.9.1/gems/chef-11.0.0/lib/chef/knife/search.rb

Apparently they are nil, any idea how to pass default values in?

@dulyanov

  knife_search.config[:start] = 0
  knife_search.config[:rows] = 1

See my clone at https://gist.github.com/bknowles/7572785 that includes these changes. Thanks!