Ansible

Introduction Configuration management is the process of handling changes to a system in a way that assures integrity over time, typically involving tools and processes that facilitate automation and observability. Even though this concept didn’t originate in the IT industry, the term is broadly used to refer to server configuration management. In the context of servers, configuration management is also commonly referred to as IT Automation or Server Orchestration. Both terms highlight the practical aspects of configuration management and the…

Introduction Ansible is a modern configuration management tool that facilitates the task of setting up and maintaining remote servers. This cheat sheet-style guide provides a quick reference to commands and practices commonly used when working with Ansible. For an overview of Ansible and how to install and configure it, please check our guide on How to Install and Configure Ansible on Ubuntu 20.04. How to Use This Guide: This guide is in cheat sheet format with self-contained command-line snippets. Jump…

Introduction In a nutshell, server configuration management (also popularly referred to as IT Automation) is a solution for turning your infrastructure administration into a codebase, describing all processes necessary for deploying a server in a set of provisioning scripts that can be versioned and easily reused. It can greatly improve the integrity of any server infrastructure over time. In a previous guide, we talked about the main benefits of implementing a configuration management strategy for your server infrastructure, how configuration…

Even though Ansible is known for managing Linux nodes using SSH, did you know that Ansible on Windows works just as well? Using Windows Remote Management (WinRM), Ansible on Windows can effectively manage all of your Windows nodes too! With Ansible on Windows, you can perform tasks like deploying patches, managing Windows servers, execute PowerShell scripts, and more. In this tutorial, you’re going to learn how to set up your first Windows node to be managed with Ansible and see…

Ansible is becoming one of the most, if not the most configuration management tool out there today. Ansible is a handy (and free in most cases) tool that allows DevOps engineers, and system engineers/administrators to build and maintain infrastructure across all environments in an idempotent, infrastructure-as-code manner. But, configuring it to talk to Windows via WinRM for Ansible can be a challenge. Like many other infrastructure components, Ansible can deploy and maintain configuration states across Windows hosts. Ansible connects to…

Managing configurations of multiple servers and environments is a big benefit of using Ansible. But what happens when configuration files vary from server to server? Rather than create a separate configuration for each server or environment, you should look into Ansible templates. In this tutorial, you’re going to learn what Ansible templates are, how they work and how you can use the Ansible template module to save tons of time. Prerequisites This post will be a step-by-step tutorial. If you’d…

If you’ve got many hosts to manage, it’s time to automate configuration management by installing Ansible! Ansible is the most popular automation tool to manage configuration changes across your on-prem and cloud resources. In this article, you’re going to learn from the ground up how to download and install an Ansible controller host on Ubuntu, RHEL, and macOS. You’ll also get a jump start on running your first commands! This tutorial will use v2.9.20 of Ansible but the process to…

Ansible is a widely used automation tool that can manage hundreds of nodes in one go. Ansible has lots of great features, and one of them is its ability to manage a single line within a file on remote nodes using the Ansible lineinfile module. The Ansible lineinfile module is a module that performs various actions on a single line on a file, such as replacing a line, updating a line, or adding a particular line. In this tutorial, you’re…

If you need to execute Ansible tasks based on different conditions, then you’re in for a treat. Ansible when and other conditionals lets you evaluate conditions, such as based on OS, or if one task is dependent on the previous task. In this tutorial, you’re going to learn how to work with Ansible when and other conditionals so you can execute tasks without messing things up. Let’s get into it! Prerequisites This tutorial comprises hands-on examples. If you’d like to…