About Resources

A resource is a statement of configuration policy that:

• Describes the desired state for a configuration item
• Declares the steps needed to bring that item to the desired state
• Specifies a resource type—such as package, template, or service
• Lists additional details (also known as resource properties), as necessary
• Are grouped into recipes, which describe working configurations

Resource Syntax

A resource is a Ruby block with four components: a type, a name, one (or more) properties (with values), and one (or more) actions. The syntax for a resource is like this:

type 'name' do
  attribute 'value'
  action :type_of_action
end

Every resource has its own set of actions and properties. Most properties have default values. Some properties are available to all resources, for example those used to send notifications to other resources and guards that help ensure that some resources are idempotent.

For example, a resource that’s used to install a tar.gz package for version 1.16.1 may look something like this:

package 'tar' do
  version '1.16.1'
  action :install
end

All actions have a default value. Only non-default behaviors of actions and properties need to be specified. For example, the package resource’s default action is :install and the name of the package defaults to the name of the resource. Therefore, it’s possible to write a resource block that installs the latest tar.gz package like this:

package 'tar'

and a resource block that installs a tar.gz package for version 1.6.1 like this:

package 'tar' do
  version '1.16.1'
end

In both cases, Chef Infra Client will use the default action (:install) to install the tar package.

Additional Information

See these guides for additional information about resources: