To Use Chef’s Basic Features, How Do You Register a Chef Client with Your Chef Server?

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Problem scenario
You have installed Chef server on a RedHat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) server in AWS.  You have installed Chef client on another RHEL instance in  AWS.  You simply want your Chef client to receive configuration management changes (e.g., you want Chef recipes to work).  The command “chef node list” on your Chef client server returns no servers.  You ran this command from the Chef client:

sudo chef-client -S https://<FQDN of Chef server>/organization/contint

But you received an error like this:

Chef encountered an error attempting to create the client “<FQDN of Chef Client computer>”
================================================================================

System Info:
————
chef_version=13.4.19
ruby=ruby 2.4.1p111 (2017-03-22 revision 58053) [x86_64-linux]
program_name=chef-client worker: ppid=5156;start=14:10:31;

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How Do You Create a Chef Automate Server in Azure?

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Problem scenario
You want to have a Chef Automate server in Azure.  How do you create one?

Solution
1.  In the Azure portal click the “New” button on the left.
2.  Search for “Chef Automate” with no quotes.
3.  Click “Create”.
4.  Fill out the required configuration settings.  Make a mental note of the Chef Automate FQDN DNS Label that you provide (e.g.,

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How Do You Create an Ubuntu Linux VM in Azure Using PowerShell Azure?

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Updated 1/12/19

Problem scenario
You want to create an Ubuntu Linux server with one vCPU and one GB of RAM in Azure using PowerShell.  You want to use Azure Resource Manager (an ARM template).  You do not want to use the Azure Portal for 95% of the work involved.  What do you do to automate the process (including the deployment of a resource group, a network security group,

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How Do You Create Servers Using .JSON Files and Resource Manager in Azure?

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Problem scenario
You want to automate the creation of servers in Azure.  You want to try ARM templates to learn more about them.  How do you use .json files and Azure PowerShell to do this (without using the web UI)?

Solution
Prerequisites
i. You have a way of running Azure PowerShell commands.  If you need assistance with this, see this posting if your workstation is running Windows 7 or this posting if your workstation is running Windows 10. 

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How Do You Install Octopus Deploy server to a Windows 2016 Server?

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Problem scenario
You want to install Octuopus Deploy (e.g., with the 45 free trial) to an AWS instance of Windows Server 2016.  How do you do this?

Solution
This is a simple deployment of Octopus Deploy server for testing or evaluation purposes.  Literally any AWS flavor will work as only 512 MB of RAM is needed for Octopus Deploy server to work for minimal evaluation.

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How Do You Troubleshoot the Ansible Message ‘Error while linking: [Errno 2] No such file or directory … “state”: “absent”‘?

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Problem scenario
You are using the file module in Ansible.  But you get the error ‘Error while linking: [Errno 2] No such file or directory … “state”: “absent”‘.

What should you do?

Solution
Some people get this problem with different versions of Ansible 2.x.  It is documented on this external page.

Rewrite your Ansible playbook so it uses a “shell” module and some “ln -s” command.

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How Do You Deploy Docker to Ubuntu Linux Servers Using Puppet?

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Problem scenario
You want to deploy Docker to Ubuntu Linux using Puppet.  How do you write a manifest to install Docker an Ubuntu server?

Solution
This solution demonstrates transferring a file with Puppet.  

1.  Install Puppet master on an Ubuntu Server.  See this link if you want directions.
2.  Install Puppet agent on a different Ubuntu server.  See this 

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How Do You Deploy Docker to RedHat Linux Servers Using Puppet?

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Problem scenario
You want to use Puppet to deploy Docker to a RHEL server in AWS.  How do you do this?

Solution
Warning: This may not work for Puppet versions 5 or higher. It should work for Puppet version 4 or lower. This solution is not a best practice.  It is quick way to deploy a version of Docker made for CentOS to RHEL instances. 

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How Do You Deploy Puppet Agent 3.x to a RedHat Linux Instance in AWS?

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Update on 12/4/17
If you want to install Puppet Agent 5.x (a much newer version), see this posting instead.

Problem scenario
You installed Puppet Master on an AWS instance of RedHat Enterprise Linux.  (See this link if you want to install Puppet Master). You now want another AWS instance of RHEL 7.x to be configured as a Puppet Agent node. You want to run a manifest to make sure that this new Puppet Agent node (i.e.,

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How Do You Install Puppet Master on a RedHat Linux Server (an AWS Instance)?

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Problem scenario
You want to install Puppet Master on RHEL 7.x running in AWS.  You only have five minutes to complete this task.  How do you install Puppet Master immediately?

Solution
1.  Create puppetinstaller.sh in the /tmp directory.  It should have the following lines (stop before you get to step #2):

#!/bin/bash
# Written by continualintegration.com

yum -y install ntp
echo ‘
server 0.us.pool.ntp.org
server 1.us.pool.ntp.org
server 2.us.pool.ntp.org
server 3.us.pool.ntp.org’ >>

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