how to set password for user at run time in chef

Question

How to set password for user creation in chef , at run time . instead of the encrypting mechanism using openssl and setting it in user resource in chef.

instead of the following method:

openssl passwd -1 "theplaintextpassword"
$1$JJsvHslV$szsCjVEroftprNn4JHtDi.

then setting it in user resource

user "random" do  
  supports :manage_home => true  
  comment "Random User"  
  uid 1234  
  gid "users"  
  home "/home/random"  
  shell "/bin/bash"  
  password "$1$JJsvHslV$szsCjVEroftprNn4JHtDi."  
end

Is there any alternative ..??

Answer 1

You could try generating the password ciphertext using Ruby in your cookbook:

require 'digest/sha2'

password = "pass@123"
salt = rand(36**8).to_s(36)
shadow_hash = password.crypt("$6$" + salt)

After running this, shadow_hash contains the following string: $6$vf1ehwzs$VAxaPBAeXjvEMboee.xbJgMOXlCrJ.eJDPkqP.16fGyAqjq1IDkh0OpEXFRo1W04G7tl02YMQz7dKmGKLVaRd/

You can then use it in the user resource:

user "random" do  
  supports :manage_home => true  
  comment "Random User"  
  uid 1234  
  gid "users"  
  home "/home/random"  
  shell "/bin/bash"  
  password shadow_hash
end

From http://judepereira.com/blog/use-ruby-to-generate-your-shadow-password/