why-run mode is a way to see what the chef-client would have configured, had an actual chef-client run occurred. This approach is similar to the concept of “no-operation” (or “no-op”): decide what should be done, but then don’t actually do anything until it’s done right. Run the executable in why-run mode, which is a type of chef-client run that does everything except modify the system.

When why-run mode is enabled, a chef-client run will occur that does everything up to the point at which configuration would normally occur. This includes

1. Getting the configuration data,
2. Authenticating to the Chef server,
3. Rebuilding the node object,
4. Expanding the run-list,
5. Getting the necessary cookbook files,
6. Resetting node attributes,
7. Identifying the resources, and
8. Building the resource collection and
9. Does not include mapping each resource to a provider or configuring any part of the system.

How to run chef-client?

$ sudo chef-client -o 'recipe[ntp]' --why-run
$ sudo chef-client -o 'recipe[ntp]' -W

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