Module 6: Configuration Management (Ansible)

6.1 Ansible Overview

Ansible is an open-source software provisioning, configuration management, and application-deployment tool enabling infrastructure as code. It runs on many Unix-like systems, and can configure both Unix-like systems as well as Microsoft Windows.

6.2 Playbooks and Roles

Playbooks are Ansible's configuration, deployment, and orchestration language. They can describe a policy you want your remote systems to enforce, or a set of steps in a general IT process.

---
- name: Install Nginx
  hosts: webservers
  become: yes
  tasks:
    - name: Ensure Nginx is installed
      apt:
        name: nginx
        state: present

6.3 Inventory Management

Ansible works against multiple managed nodes or "hosts" in your infrastructure at the same time, using a list or group of lists known as inventory.

6.4 Ansible Galaxy

Ansible Galaxy is a repository for Ansible Roles that are available to drop directly into your Playbooks to streamline your automation projects.