title: The various components of Chef
body: <p>Just getting started with chef and it looks like there are several components, which I'm finding rather confusing. They are all available for download via <a href="https://downloads.chef.io/" rel="nofollow">https://downloads.chef.io/</a></p>
  
  <ul>
  <li><code>chef server</code> to manage the centralized chef server</li>
  <li><code>chef client</code> to manage each node</li>
  <li><code>chefdk</code> to assist in development of chef</li>
  <li><code>chef "workstation"</code> - Not even sure if this is a thing, but I see it mentioned in various articles and tutorials. But it's not on the downloads page...</li>
  </ul>
  
  <p>I stumbled across another site that suggested I install it via command line as follows, using a <code>bash</code> installation script. </p>
  
  <pre><code>curl -L https://www.opscode.com/chef/install.sh | bash
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I ran it and it installed several utilities (<code>knife</code>, <code>chef-apply</code>, etc..) to my <code>/opt/chef/bin</code> directory</p>
  
  <pre><code>&gt; ls -hlt /opt/chef/bin/
  total 32K
  -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1.5K Apr 28 09:57 chef-apply
  -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1.6K Apr 28 09:57 chef-client
  -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1.6K Apr 28 09:57 chef-service-manager
  -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1.5K Apr 28 09:57 chef-shell
  -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1.5K Apr 28 09:57 chef-solo
  -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1.6K Apr 28 09:57 chef-windows-service
  -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1.5K Apr 28 09:57 knife
  -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root  732 Apr 28 09:57 ohai
  </code></pre>
  
  <ol>
  <li><p>What did I just install? Is that the chef workstation (i.e. plain old <code>chef</code>?). Or is it some odd subset/combination of the other 3 components? </p></li>
  <li><p>If I download one of the other components (e.g. <code>chefdk</code>) from the Chef Downloads page, does it just add more binary executables in the same directory or does it nicely create a <code>/opt/chefdk/bin</code> directory or similar? I ask because I'm a little overwhelmed by everything it's install and am having a hard time keeping track of it. Would love if it were just one giant tool with various sub-commands.</p></li>
  </ol>
  
  <p>Thanks!</p>