Ansible is an open-source software solution used for configuration management, application deployment, intra-service orchestration, and many other things. It is a powerful tool to deploy all things in your infrastructure from the ground up.
It can help automate the following items:
- Bare-metal devices
- Network devices
- Storage devices
- Virtualization platforms
- Operating systems
- Containers
Special Requirements
There is not any agents or special infrastructure that needs to be deployed. Therefore, it makes it easy to deploy and get started. Ansible works by pushing out “modules” to the remote system. You model the desired state of the system and the modules ensure that the configuration on the remote device matches. That sounds great, right?
The Glue
Ansible can also be used to tie many systems together. Ansible’s core strength is being the glue that ties everything together. You can create complex tasks that perform any numerous tasks like building a multi server application stack, patching that vulnerability, or provision the network devices.
Conclusion
I might be a little biased on Ansible, but I love the freedom of it. With no agents to install, you can set up some authentication and go at it. I will be focusing on Ansible and some core things you can do with it. If you have any suggestions please leave a comment or reach out by the contact form.