get calling cookbook within chef custom resource

Question

I have a cookbook my_service with a custom resource write_config. This resource is called from another cookbook node_a.

• my_service/resources/write_config.rb:

  property :template_source, String, name_property: true 
  property :calling_cookbook, String, required: true
  
  action :create do
    template "/tmp/test.txt" do
      source   template_source
      cookbook calling_cookbook
      owner    'root'
      mode     '0644'
      action   :create
    end
  end
  

• Node cookbook recipe node_a/default.rb:

  my_service_write_config 'config.erb' do
    calling_cookbook 'node_a'
  end
  

This works fine, but I would like to get rid of the calling_cookbook property.

Is there a way to automatically get the calling_cookbook name?

Solution

(Thank you coderanger!) The basic resource template seems to get evaluated in the context of the calling (node_a) cookbook (?).

• my_service/resources/write_config.rb:

  property :template_source, String, name_property: true 
  action :create do
    template "/tmp/test.txt" do
      source   template_source
      owner    'root'
      mode     '0644'
      action   :create
    end
  end
  

• Using it within the node cookbook recipe node_a/default.rb becomes a one-liner:

  ...
  include_recipe 'my_service'
  my_service_write_config 'config.erb'
  ...
  

Neat!

Answer 1

This is tracked automatically as new_resource.cookbook_name. You may need to to_s it because somehow it ends up a symbol sometimes but otherwise should be what you need.

Also specifically for templates this is already the default behavior if you just remove the cookbook line.