Chef-solo and output formatters via config.rb?

Hi everybody,

I just noticed that setting the output formatter via solo.rb does not work:

log_level :warn
formatter "minimal"

When I run chef-solo -j dna.json -c solo.rb it picks up the correct
log_level from solo.rb but still uses the “doc” formatter.

Running chef-solo -j dna.json -c solo.rb -F min works though, so it seems
it just does not pick it up from solo.rb…

This was observed on Chef 11.4.4 and Chef 11.6.0.

Is this a known bug?

Cheers, Torben

On Tuesday, August 6, 2013 at 9:00 AM, Torben Knerr wrote:

Hi everybody,

I just noticed that setting the output formatter via solo.rb does not work:

log_level :warn
formatter "minimal"

When I run chef-solo -j dna.json -c solo.rb it picks up the correct log_level from solo.rb but still uses the "doc" formatter.

Running chef-solo -j dna.json -c solo.rb -F min works though, so it seems it just does not pick it up from solo.rb...

This was observed on Chef 11.4.4 and Chef 11.6.0.

Is this a known bug?

Cheers, Torben
Use add_formatter. Chef has support for multiple formatters, so that you could hypothetically have one that prints user readable output to the screen while another prints machine parseable output to a file (or send data over the network to a centralized storage system or whatever). The configuration settings are pretty basic right now (you only can configure a formatter name and a file path), and I'm sure people will bump into limitations once they really start using it, but that's why it is this way.

--
Daniel DeLeo

Thanks, add_formatter works! :slight_smile:

On Tue, Aug 6, 2013 at 6:07 PM, Daniel DeLeo dan@kallistec.com wrote:

On Tuesday, August 6, 2013 at 9:00 AM, Torben Knerr wrote:

Hi everybody,

I just noticed that setting the output formatter via solo.rb does not work:

log_level :warn
formatter "minimal"

When I run chef-solo -j dna.json -c solo.rb it picks up the correct
log_level from solo.rb but still uses the "doc" formatter.

Running chef-solo -j dna.json -c solo.rb -F min works though, so it
seems it just does not pick it up from solo.rb...

This was observed on Chef 11.4.4 and Chef 11.6.0.

Is this a known bug?

Cheers, Torben

Use add_formatter. Chef has support for multiple formatters, so that
you could hypothetically have one that prints user readable output to the
screen while another prints machine parseable output to a file (or send
data over the network to a centralized storage system or whatever). The
configuration settings are pretty basic right now (you only can configure a
formatter name and a file path), and I'm sure people will bump into
limitations once they really start using it, but that's why it is this way.

--
Daniel DeLeo

Oh, is there a difference / inconsistency between chef-client and chef-solo?

@miketheman reports that formatter works with chef-client:

On Tue, Aug 6, 2013 at 7:48 PM, Torben Knerr ukio@gmx.de wrote:

Thanks, add_formatter works! :slight_smile:

On Tue, Aug 6, 2013 at 6:07 PM, Daniel DeLeo dan@kallistec.com wrote:

On Tuesday, August 6, 2013 at 9:00 AM, Torben Knerr wrote:

Hi everybody,

I just noticed that setting the output formatter via solo.rb does not
work:

log_level :warn
formatter "minimal"

When I run chef-solo -j dna.json -c solo.rb it picks up the correct
log_level from solo.rb but still uses the "doc" formatter.

Running chef-solo -j dna.json -c solo.rb -F min works though, so it
seems it just does not pick it up from solo.rb...

This was observed on Chef 11.4.4 and Chef 11.6.0.

Is this a known bug?

Cheers, Torben

Use add_formatter. Chef has support for multiple formatters, so that
you could hypothetically have one that prints user readable output to the
screen while another prints machine parseable output to a file (or send
data over the network to a centralized storage system or whatever). The
configuration settings are pretty basic right now (you only can configure a
formatter name and a file path), and I'm sure people will bump into
limitations once they really start using it, but that's why it is this way.

--
Daniel DeLeo

On Tuesday, August 6, 2013 at 12:20 PM, Torben Knerr wrote:

Oh, is there a difference / inconsistency between chef-client and chef-solo?

@miketheman reports that formatter works with chef-client:
Adds formatter option to Chef Provisioner by miketheman · Pull Request #1250 · hashicorp/vagrant · GitHub

Could be dependent on 10.x vs. 11.x, we made a few changes to the way this stuff is configured when formatters became the default in 11.0

--
Daniel DeLeo