template override between cookbooks

foo.rb

template "/tmp/foo.rb"
  source "foo.rb.erb"
  cookbook "banana"
end

other_shit.rb

include_recipe "whatever_cookbook::foo"

begin
  t = resources(:template => "/tmp/foo.rb")
  t.source "bonkers.rb.erb"
  t.cookbook "definitely_not_banana"
rescue Chef::Exceptions::ResourceNotFound
  Chef::Log.warn "could not find template /tmp/foo.rb to modify"
end

Line 4, you can also use the more terse notation,

t = resources("template[/tmp/foo.rb]")

Fun tricks can be played by modifying the variables passed into the template, too, allowing you to override the template from an "upstream" cookbook without actually changing the code. That can avoid the "cookbook shadowing" deprecation warnings in some configurations.

foo.rb is missing a do in the first line.

Excellent, thanks

Thanks for this. You saved my day!

Thanks! did the trick.

How do you send variables to the overridden template?