title: Chef clients and validators
body: <p>I'm trying to understand the concept of Chef clients and validators, and their relationship to the bootstrapping process.</p>
  
  <p>According to <a href="http://docs.opscode.com/server_manage_clients.html">this article</a>, the chef-client will use the <code>/etc/chef/validation.pem</code> private key to authenticate itself for the initial run, because <code>/etc/chef/client.pem</code> doesn't exist yet. This initial run will, somehow, produce that <code>client.pem</code>, which is then used for all subsequent client requests.</p>
  
  <p>My questions:</p>
  
  <ol>
  <li>What process places the <code>/etc/chef/validation.pem</code> file on the chef-client node in the first place? The bootstrap? Can someone provide an example of a knife command that would do this?</li>
  <li>Same question, but for the <code>/etc/chef/client.pem</code> file.</li>
  <li>What dictates the names of the chef-client and its chef-validator?</li>
  </ol>