Ansible is a powerful and simple open source IT automation engine that can greatly improve the scalability, consistency, and reliability of your IT environment. It does this through configuration management, application deployment, task automation, and IT orchestration. Ansible is written in Python and uses YAML for its playbooks, which are plain-text files that contain the steps needed to execute any given task or procedure.
Ansible’s main features include:
- Automation That Is Easy to Read & Write: Ansible’s playbooks are simple, human-readable text files written in YAML. This makes it easy to create and manage playbooks and tasks, rather than having to write complex scripts.
- Agentless: Ansible works agentless, meaning it does not require any additional software to be installed on managed nodes. Instead, it uses SSH and existing operating system credential to access and control nodes remotely.
- Push-Based Configuration: Unlike other automation systems, Ansible pushes out the changes to the nodes based on task file instructions instead of having nodes “pull” the changes from a centralized location.
- High Scalability: Ansible can deploy to an unlimited number of nodes with just a few commands.
- Low Complexity: Ansible requires no agents, databases, or extra software on the server side – just SSH.
- Handles Multiple Operating Systems: Ansible can handle multiple operating systems from Mac OS X, Red Hat Linux, Ubuntu, and Windows.
- Highly Secure: Ansible encrypts communication between client and server for highly secure and reliable operations.
- Built-in Deployment Enhancement: Ansible integrates with cloud-based services such as Amazon Web Services, OpenStack, and Rackspace to enable automated deployment.
- Community Support: Ansible has a growing community of users who are actively engaged in sharing best practices, tutorials, and user stories.
Ansible is an excellent choice for any IT infrastructure, whether you’re looking at small-scale automation, large-scale deployments, or anything in between. Its flexibility, scalability, and ease of use make it a powerful tool for managing IT environment.
