ChefConf Learning Paths: Build your custom agenda

Heading to ChefConf? Here are some sample schedules to help you get the most out of your time in Austin! Whether you’re totally new to this whole DevOps and Chef thing, or you’re a distributed systems engineer building ultra scalable microservices with Habitat, there are sessions perfect for you. Be sure to download the ChefConf app prior to the conference, create an account, and select the sessions you want to attend.

First ChefConf

If you are new to Chef and DevOps and this is your first ChefConf, here are a few suggested sessions that will help build a great foundation for your infrastructure, compliance, and application automation projects, and learn about cultural transformation with DevOps.

Tuesday, May 23

1:30PM – 2:10PM Getting Started with Habitat – This is the talk for anyone just learning about Habitat or those that are interested in seeing some of the newer features of the framework.

1:50PM – 2:20 PM How to Get Started with Habitat Q&A

2:30PM – 3:10PM Managed Chef in the Cloud: Introducing AWS OpsWorks for Chef Automate – Getting started with Chef has never been easier. In this session, we’ll show how to spin up OpsWorks for Chef Automate in AWS. You’ll have visibility into your fleet in minutes.

Wednesday, May 24

2:00PM – 2:40PM The Hand-Waver’s Guide To Contributing To Open Source – You don’t need to be an engineer to join this open source community. In this talk, you’ll learn to improve your favorite open source projects, to submit a pull request (that won’t be immediately rejected) and how to prioritize your obstacles.

Building A DevOps Culture

Ready to learn about how to transform your work life culture into a more collaborative and accountable setting where engineering and IT teams align to ship greater business value faster and support each other at all stages of the development lifecycle? This is the track for you.

Tuesday, May 23

1:30PM – 2:10PM Diversity is Not Just a Checklist – Diversity is an important goal to achieve in many organizations, however, it isn’t always met. In this talk, you can learn how to create a healthy culture within your organization.

2:30PM – 3:10PM Adding Developers to the DevOps Process – Learn how to work as a developer/operations team instead of separate silos. There may be a few obstacles to jump through, but it will be worth it.

Wednesday, May 24

1:00PM – 1:40PM The Road More Traveled: Putting Transformation Back on the Rails – Learn how to make the best out of a DevOps transformation. Don’t struggle with the change, embrace it and see the progress

1:00PM – 1:40PM Faking Coherence for Engineer – Are you tired of sounding as if you don’t know what you are talking about? Learn how to improve in sharing what you know and how to be clear about what you don’t know.

2:00PM – 2:40PM DevOps Transformation at Absa Bank: Technical Evolution; Cultural Revolution – Learn about our transformation to DevOps teamwork. You’ll see the tools, process and culture put into how are teams were formed.

Application Developers

For developers looking to transform the way they build, manage and run applications, our Habitat sessions are the way to go. We have introductory sessions as well as deeper dives, so choose your own adventure. Come by the Habitat Zone on Level 4 and talk with the core team and meet the speakers after their sessions.

Tuesday, May 23

1:30PM – 2:10PM Getting Started with Habitat –  This is the talk for anyone just learning about Habitat or those that are interested in seeing some of the newer features of the framework.

1:50PM – 2:20PM Getting Started with Habitat Q&A

2:30PM – 3:10PM Habitat in Production – This is the session for anyone who is ready to run Habitat services in a production environment.

2:50PM – 3:20PM Habitat in Production Q&A

3:30PM – 4:10PM How Habitat can Boost your Chef Ecosystem – Are you curious about how Chef and habitat play together? This talk will show you how GE uses both tools and how they complement one another.

Wednesday, May 24

1:00PM – 2:40PM Python Applications with Habitat – Learn how Media Temple used Habitat in production with Python.

1:50PM – 2:20PM Python Applications with Habitat Q&A

2:00PM – 2:40PM Ephemeral Apps with Chef, Terraform, Nomad, and Habitat – Learn how these tools can provision all the infrastructure required for a cluster in 2-3 minutes.

2:50PM – 3:20PM Chef and Terraform, Habitat and Nomad Q&A

3:00PM – 3:40PM Kubernetes & Habitat

3:40PM – 4:20PM K8’s and Habitat Q&A

Compliance Automation

Compliance no longer has to be a silo in your organization. Learn how to use InSpec to empower your compliance officers and security engineers to collaborate with your developers and IT teams to be able to programmatically define, measure, and track compliance across your fleet.

Tuesday, May 23

2:30PM – 3:10PM Mario Star Power Your Infrastructure: Getting the Most Out of InSpec – Learn all the delightful things you can do with InSpec.

3:30PM – 4:10PM STIG Automation w/ Chef and Inspec – Need to comply with The DoD’s Security Technical Implementation Guides? Learn how to use InSpec to ingest STIG data, read and determine what STIGs apply to you, and how to remediate STIGs with Chef. We will explore the anatomy of a well written InSpec control and some of the more complex Chef and Ruby resources.

Wednesday, May 24

1:00PM – 1:40PM My Journey Into Technology Through InSpec  See how a Chef Community member used InSpec to begin her career in technology.

2:00PM – 3:00PM Kickstarting our DevOps Transition with Chef Compliance – In this talk, you will learn why we started our DevOps transformation using Chef and InSpec to solve various business problems.

3:00PM – 3:40PM Chef Cookbook Testing Like a Pro – If you are fearful of the fast movement that automated infrastructure can cause, this is the perfect session for you. Learn the available tools for testing the services as well as techniques to avoid busy work in your testing.

We’re really looking forward to seeing you next week in Austin. Have a great time and thanks again for being a part of the Chef Community!

Posted in:

Jessica DeVita

Former Chef Employee