Chef will not checkout development branch from git

Question

Below is my code for checking out my repo. I want the development branch in my chef dev environment.

git "/home/ubuntu/workspace/repo" do                            
    repository "[email protected]:me/repo.git"
    revision "development"                                 
    action :sync                                     
    user "root"                                                                  
end

when I look at the checkout branch I get:

* deploy
  master

if I run git checkout development on the box I get:

deploy
* development
  master

So....how do I get git to checkout my dev branch from chef?

I am using the example from the chef wiki. chef wiki git example

if node.chef_environment == "QA"
    branch_name = "staging"
else
    branch_name = "master"
end

git "/home/user/deployment" do                            
    repository "[email protected]:gitsite/deployment.git"
    revision branch_name                                  
    action :sync                                     
    user "user"                                    
    group "test"                                      
end

Answer 1

Your development branch gets deployed. It is only named deploy because chef checks out into a local branch instead of a detached HEAD.

The git provider

Here's an excerpt from the actual code:

#File: chef-0.10.8/lib/chef/provider/git.rb
def checkout                                                              
  sha_ref = target_revision                                               
  # checkout into a local branch rather than a detached HEAD              
  shell_out!("git checkout -b deploy #{sha_ref}", run_options(:cwd => @new_resource.destination))
  Chef::Log.info "#{@new_resource} checked out branch: #{@new_resource.revision} reference: #{sha_ref}"
end

You'd also see an info messages within your chef client's log from which the deployed branch can be seen:

[Sun, 01 Jul 2012 18:07:40 +0200] INFO: git[/usr/local/rbenv] checked out branch: master reference: 6778c8e905d774d4dc70724c455e6fcff4c1d3e1

Documentation

Also, the link to the docs in your question clearly says:

Keep in mind that if you use the command "git status" after running this recipe it will return the branch name as "deploy" regardless, as this is a default value. You should be able to see it checking out the correct branch when you run chef-client with debugging on:

sudo chef-client -l debug

More information on a detached HEAD state can be found e.g. at AlBlue's blog