Leveraging Ansible for Automation: A Game-Changer for Business Transformation and Success

Automation, particularly with Ansible, is a crucial aspect of modern business operations that you simply cannot afford to ignore. This article aims to shed light on the importance of automation and the role of Ansible, a leading automation platform, in driving business success.

Automation is transforming the way businesses operate, boosting efficiency, accelerating time to market, and enhancing security. 

Ansible Use Cases

Here are some real-world success stories that illustrate the power of automation:

Cepsa — Link

Cepsa enhanced its efficiency with the Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform, saving over 6,000 work hours through a centralized automation approach. 

• This resulted in 10-15% faster IT response times and improved IT security with enhanced access controls. For instance, technicians can now reset their passwords within five minutes, a process that previously took over 30 minutes. 
• Services can be restarted without credentials, reducing human errors and ensuring consistency as the process is predetermined in the code.

Emory University — Link

• Emory University used an Ansible Playbook to apply patches in just a few hours, a process that typically takes 2 weeks.

ANZ New Zealand — Link

ANZ New Zealand leveraged automation to reduce the time required for end-to-end DNS provisioning from 6 days to just 5 minutes, achieving a time savings of 99.4%. 

• This was made possible by automating routine and repetitive network operations tasks, which traditionally required manual governance. 
• The adoption of agile development practices, including continuous integration and delivery (CI/CD), fostered a culture of collaboration and community, leading to significant time savings

Automation offers numerous benefits to your organization, including: -

Operational Efficiency: 

Automation can save time and cost on manual repetitive work, reducing months of work to just days.

Faster Time to Market: 

With automation, infrastructure provision that would usually take months can be completed in a few hours.

Security Threats Management: 

Automation enhances the response to security threats, saving downtime and costs caused by vulnerabilities. 

Example: Consider a scenario where a Denial of Service (DoS) attack is detected from a specific IP address, say 195.x.x. With automation mechanisms in place, the firewall device can take immediate action by dropping all incoming packets from that address. A new rule is promptly created, ensuring enhanced protection. Security administrators are immediately notified, allowing for swift response and resolution. In cases of false alarms, the firewall efficiently blocks such attempts to avoid unnecessary disruptions. This example illustrates how automation can significantly improve response times to security threats, thereby saving downtime and costs caused by vulnerabilities.

Reference — Link

Ansible is a powerful tool that facilitates seamless platform provisioning, efficient application deployment, and robust security management across a diverse range of devices. It effortlessly manages everything from firewalls and load balancers to storage networks and infrastructure.

Overview of Ansible Architecture

Reference — Link

Ansible’s architecture comprises several key components:

Automation Controller (formerly Ansible Tower):

This is the control plane that includes a 

• user interface (UI), 
• REST API, 
• role-based access control (RBAC), 
• workflows, and continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) capabilities.

Execution Environments (formerly Ansible Engine):

These are defined, consistent, and portable environments for executing Ansible Playbooks and roles. They offer a simple, flexible way to build, reuse, and scale automation content.

An execution environment contains 

• UBI 8 as a base operating system, 
• Ansible-core (the core automation language), 
• Python 3.8, and 
• Any number of Ansible Content Collections, along with their dependencies (if applicable).

Automation Mesh:

This feature enables independent scaling of control and execution plane capacity, offering flexible and fault-tolerant design options, with resilience to high latency and connection disruptions.

Automation Hub:

This hub provides a place for Ansible Automation Platform subscribers to quickly find and use content that is supported by Red Hat and our technology partners, delivering additional reassurance for the most demanding environments. 

As discussions about automation continue, a significant challenge is cultivating an automation culture and driving its adoption within the organization. This process is further complicated by the need to determine the necessary organizational roles and resource allocations.

Planning Your Organization’s Resources for Automation

Journey to Resource Planning for Automation — Reference — Link

Here is a clear guide based on Red Hat on how you can plan your organization’s resources and start the automation journey:

Automation Architect 

This role is responsible for designing, developing, and implementing the company’s automation strategy. 

The goal is to bring automation to the organization for all repeatable tasks as efficiently as possible. 

Key responsibilities:

• include evangelizing automation in the organization, 
• being responsible for the automation strategy, and 
• having a say in choosing automation tooling in the organization.

Automation Administrator:

This role involves reliably configuring, deploying, running, and managing automation for multiple teams and apps inside the organization. Responsibilities include 

• installing, configuring, and maintaining the automation platform in the organization, 
• giving users access via RBAC, and 
• allowing integrations with different internal/external tools.

Creator:

This role involves building automation content (Ansible content), testing it locally, and ensuring it runs the same in production. Responsibilities include 

• writing Playbooks and Roles, 
• maintaining all Automation as code in source control, and 
• working mostly on the command line and leveraging developer tools such as VSCode

Automation Operator:

This role involves applying automation content created by the developer/creator. The operator needs to know what prebuilt, certified content is available to automate with more speed and efficiency. Responsibilities include 

• utilizing the Automation platform provided by the Automation Administrator and 
• building and maintaining workflows and inventories to automate.

Embracing automation, especially with a powerful tool like Ansible, isn’t just about keeping up with tech trends - it’s a strategic game-changer. When organizations weave automation into their daily operations, they unlock a world of benefits. We’re talking about turbo-charged operational efficiency, lightning-fast market entry, rock-solid security, and teamwork like you’ve never seen before.

By tapping into the power of Ansible and cultivating an automation-friendly culture, organizations can confidently ride the waves of the ever-changing market and stay ahead of the pack in terms of innovation and success.

As we sign off, remember that the journey of automation isn’t a one-time event, but a continuous voyage filled with opportunities for growth and transformation at every turn. 

As we navigate the exciting world of automation and Ansible, remember that no question is too small or too complex. If you find yourself pondering over a concept, or if there’s something you’d like to delve deeper into, don’t hesitate to reach out. As an expert in this field, learned from the very best Ricardo (trainer and guru), I’m here to help you unravel the intricacies and unlock the full potential of these powerful tools. Looking forward to our continued journey in this fascinating realm.

Stay curious, stay innovative, and most importantly, enjoy the ride!

References:

• Calizo, M. (2021). How to achieve automation maturity without replacing all your tools. [online] www.redhat.com. Available at: https://www.redhat.com/architect/automation-adoption-strategy [Accessed 3 May 2024].

• Cavanaugh, S. (n.d.). Introducing Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform 2.1. [online] www.ansible.com. Available at: https://www.ansible.com/blog/introducing-red-hat-ansible-automation-platform-2.1.

• Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform 2. (n.d.). Available at: https://www.redhat.com/rhdc/managed-files/ma-ansible-automation-platform-2-ebook-f30107-202109-en_1.pdf [Accessed 3 May 2024].

• www.redhat.com. (n.d.). Cepsa boosts efficiency with Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform. [online] Available at: https://www.redhat.com/en/resources/cepsa-case-study.