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Ansible

Ansible

Overview

What is Ansible?

The Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform (acquired by Red Hat in 2015) is a foundation for building and operating automation across an organization. The platform includes tools needed to implement enterprise-wide automation, and can automate resource provisioning, and IT environments…

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Recent Reviews
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Reviewer Pros & Cons

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Video Reviews

3 videos

Is it worth it? | Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform Review
04:14
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform Review | Words from an Automation Architect
03:12
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform Review | Systems Admin Thoughts
06:37
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Pricing

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Basic Tower

5,000

On Premise
per year

Enterprise Tower

10,000

On Premise
per year

Premium Tower

14,000

On Premise
per year

Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services
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Product Demos

WebLogic Continuous Deployment with Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

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Trusted Automation Series: F5 BigIP

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Manage your Cisco devices with Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

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Network Automation Basics - First Ansible Playbook

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Deep Dive - Automated NetOps - Ansible for Network GitOps

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Product Details

What is Ansible?

The Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform (acquired by Red Hat in 2015) is a foundation for building and operating automation across an organization. The platform includes tools needed to implement enterprise-wide automation, and can automate resource provisioning, and IT environments and configuration of systems and devices. It can be used in a CI/CD process to provision the target environment and to then deploy the application on it.

Its Automation Hub provides a one-stop-shop for Ansible content that is backed by support from Red Hat and its partners to deliver additional reassurance for demanding environments.

The Ansible project and Ansible Engine are open source technologies. The Ansible project is built by the community (ansible.com/community) for the benefit of the community. Ansible Engine is developed by Red Hat with the explicit intent of being used as an enterprise IT platform.

Ansible Technical Details

Deployment TypesOn-premise
Operating SystemsLinux
Mobile ApplicationNo

Frequently Asked Questions

The Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform (acquired by Red Hat in 2015) is a foundation for building and operating automation across an organization. The platform includes tools needed to implement enterprise-wide automation, and can automate resource provisioning, and IT environments and configuration of systems and devices. It can be used in a CI/CD process to provision the target environment and to then deploy the application on it.

Reviewers rate Performance highest, with a score of 8.7.

The most common users of Ansible are from Enterprises (1,001+ employees).
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(261)

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(1-25 of 63)
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Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use it to automate tasks so that things are consistent and across the board, we use it to deploy software, deploy agents, basically automation. Consistency or inconsistency. When we're doing installations or configuration on different boxes, it helps us see problems and differences, inconsistency when we have different staff members doing things differently, it helps us implement a sense of control around that.
  • For example, when we want to do a deployment of a new software agent or a new piece of code it also helps us to offload tasks to junior team members to where we can just put a series of complicated steps into a playbook and hand it off to an operator level person to coordinate and deploy. Like if it requires an outage or something, they just can focus on coordinating a schedule for doing it, but not on the technical aspects of the task.
  • I saw a demo this morning during the keynote where they talked about using natural language and basically having the playbook write itself. I thought that was awesome and I thought that that's one of the biggest hurdles to being able to leverage Ansible is to learn its syntax. And it can be very picky about the syntax and spacing when you're writing a playbook. So I would say if it wasn't so picky, it would be easier to pick up and learn.
The thing I mentioned earlier where we're constantly dealing with federal regulations or new agents that they want us to install and deploy and just getting those out in a consistent manner in a canned installation via Playbook is ideal.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We currently use Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform throughout or IT department. Our goal is to automate as much of the administration as possible as well as the repetitive tasks that we do every day. It also helps with configuration/patching and server builds
  • Automation
  • Configuration Integrity
  • Job detail refresh in web interface
  • UI improvements (a bit clunky)
Red Hat Automation platform is excellent tool to run Ansible jobs for those who are beginners with running and writing Ansible playbooks right up to the experts.

We are looking forward to using the new Event Driven Ansible
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
To better validate the applications we support, we have built an extensive set of Ansible jobs, some are scheduled and some are on-demand.
  • Easily create the scheduled or on-demand validation jobs
  • Ansible jobs could be run by other users via granting the proper privilege
  • No agent required on the hosting server
  • More flow control functionality in Ansible Job Flow
  • Better IDE
We had a set of validation scripts running on hosts before we adopt Ansible Automation Platform. Accessibility and security was a major concern. Also, the scheduling was cron-based and not flexible. Moving to Ansible help us resolve such issues/concerns.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
From early 2020 when I joined my current organization, I have been using Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform on a daily-basis. It allows me to deploy, configure and deliver applications automatically.
  • Cloud infrastructure automation saves time and finances.
  • Ansible allows me to connect with teams and deliver efficiencies for my agency when automating apps procedures.
  • It combines hybrid cloud, edge, network and security automation in one place.
  • Enterprise tower is way too expensive but the impacts that we get is remarkable.
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is the best tool out there for carrying out automation processes. On my end, it allows me to manage IT and network procedures across software-defined and cloud-based networks.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use the AAP as a building block in many end-to-end infrastructure and platform related build and deployment processes as well as a foundation for maintaining IaC and CasC principles that we adhere in the organization. The major complaint would be related to fair number of bugs the most of the new releases contain. The regression testing process can be improved at this point. Also, sometimes the bug fixes don’t get backported to the previous minor release, which forces us to perform more frequent upgrades. It impacts the platform availability due to increased number of maintenance windows required to support the product. At this point we always run on N-1 minor release to ensure stability (over new features and bugs that a just released version normally contains). It would be great if all the bug fixes are backported to the previous minor releases.
  • Distributed deployment options
  • RBAC
  • Identity providers options
  • UI has always been a problem and a cause of the users complaints. Specifically the option of following the job output.
The product is invaluable in the areas where post infra deployment configuration is required. It is not too suited for infra deployment as it is hard to maintain and remediate the state.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform allows us to automate connecting in one single integrated solution. This platform enables me to track and manage holistic network and IT processes.
  • Makes it easy to create and share automation in one central hub.
  • Ansible content collections give me the ability to reuse code, making it rapid to carry out complex IT processes.
  • Event-driven automation allows me to reduce manual tasks: it is rapid to know which action to take and respond automatically by receiving events from external apps automatically.
  • The price is a bit high.
  • Lack of mobile apps for iOS and Android.
  • Complexity in third-party service integration.
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is a one-stop solution for executing and managing automation. I can’t wait to see other business users using this tool to develop and deploy applications.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform enables me to create, execute, manage, and share automation in one single integrated system.
  • It allows me to automate IT actions through user-defined and rule-based constructs.
  • Manage inventory automatically.
  • Boost collaboration of teams in one place.
  • Eradicate human errors by getting rid of manual tasks.
  • It was a bit complex to integrate with other external applications during the initial stage.
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is remarkable for defining, operating, and delegating automation. On my end, complex manual processes for configuring systems are simplified by this platform.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Firewall Policy Automation to allow app teams to directly generate their required access on the Firewall, Load Balancer automation for building VIPs and moving traffic with pipelines, creating new networks in IP space and on network devices, network compliance that enforces audit requirements on several platforms, automated credential rotation on infrastructure, data gathering, TLS certificate installs, monitoring, and automated self-healing, as well as hundreds of automation tasks outside of the infrastructure teams.
  • Automation for every platform due to agentless architecture.
  • Easy adoption due to human readable code and simple-to-use GUI.
  • Great API that can be called from ServiceNow forms, Pipelines, GitHub Webhooks, or anywhere else.
  • A secure vault that is customizable and can plug into systems like Hashicorp or CyberArk to pull updated credentials in real-time when a job runs.
  • Workflows should have more flexible paths than just success or failure.
  • The upgrade process can be challenging with differences in security and environment.
  • There is an opportunity to add CICD functionality into the tool.
  • For development, it would be nice to have the option of editing a repo directly from AAP to allow quick tests/reruns. Then, allow it to push the updates back or create a new branch/PR in GitHub.
  • The RBAC is good but could use improvements. One example would be an option that allows admins to assume the access of another user to validate it works as expected.
Ansible and AAP is well suited for orchestrating over many platforms. Its agentless architecture makes it ideal for infrastructure that cannot support an agent. It has a strong module library for the most common products, services, and platforms. It is by far the best language for anyone new to coding or automation to jump in and quickly get to a productive state. While AAP is capable of automating nearly anything, there are still advantages of using other platforms in its place. For example, Chef has been valuable for server automation because of the availability of existing cookbooks. For systems that can run an agent, having the individual nodes perform their own checks can scale a little better than the centralized model of AAP. But running an agent also means the potential risk of resource over utilization.
June 01, 2023

Ansible Review

BHANUCHANDRA KOMMALAPATI | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
we are using Ansible for patching and configuration management
  • OS patching
  • server build
  • Configration management
  • sameple playbooks from Red Hat community
  • Pricing
  • more focus for windows
for confiration and server deployements it is very good to use
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
The platform addresses several business problems, such as:

1.) Manual and repetitive tasks: Ansible Automation Platform helps eliminate manual, repetitive tasks by automating them. This reduces human error, increases efficiency, and allows IT teams to focus on more strategic initiatives.

2.) Configuration management: Managing configurations across a large number of systems can be challenging. Ansible Automation Platform enables centralized management of configurations, ensuring consistency and compliance across the infrastructure.

3.) Application deployment and orchestration: Deploying and managing applications across different environments can be time-consuming and error-prone. Ansible Automation Platform simplifies application deployment and provides orchestration capabilities to streamline the process.

4.) Infrastructure provisioning: Provisioning and managing infrastructure resources can be complex, especially in cloud or hybrid environments. Ansible Automation Platform helps automate infrastructure provisioning, enabling organizations to scale resources efficiently and consistently.
  • Configuration management at scale
  • Infrastructure as code
  • Cross-platform and cross-environment compatibility
  • Managing systems off corporate network; i.e. company provided equipment.
  • Think windows MDM... how do we manage systems off of corporate network.
Based on its idempotent nature, Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is well suited for the following scenarios:

1.) Configuration management: Ansible excels in managing and maintaining consistent configurations across a large number of systems. Whether it's configuring software, network devices, or infrastructure components, Ansible's idempotent operations ensure that desired states are achieved and maintained, even in complex environments.

2.) Continuous deployment and integration (CI/CD): Ansible is well suited for automating application deployment and orchestrating CI/CD pipelines. Its idempotent execution ensures consistent and reproducible deployments, making it easier to roll out updates, manage multiple environments, and integrate with popular CI/CD tools.

3.) Infrastructure provisioning and orchestration: Ansible is an excellent choice for provisioning and managing infrastructure resources. Its idempotent playbooks enable organizations to automate the creation and configuration of servers, virtual machines, containers, and cloud resources, allowing for scalable and consistent infrastructure provisioning.

4.) System administration and operations: Ansible's idempotent nature makes it ideal for system administration tasks and operational automation. Whether it's managing user accounts, updating software packages, or performing routine maintenance tasks, Ansible ensures that operations are executed reliably and consistently across different systems and environments.

Ansible is the way...
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
ResellerIncentivized
Post-provisioning configuration management to provide automated OS & application installation/configuration for VMs provisioned via Aria Automation. Provides faster, more agility and removes risk from human error when configuring applications to meet specific customer-facing use cases.
  • Managing configuration of newly provisioned resources.
  • Managing configuration drift for long lifecycle workloads.
  • Removes logic coding in favor of low-code declarative definition files.
  • Little to no governance around provisioning limits, leases, approvals, etc.
  • Needs loosely coupled provisioning intent rather than hard-coded rules.
  • Could benefit from graphical/visual app stack designer.
For IT shops that do not have much developer experience and/or need to have a robust service catalog, AAP is pretty weak. The hybrid cloud story is muddy at best and could stand to have a CI/CD pipeline-like tool that allows non-developers to create complex workflows using smaller low-code piece parts.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use Ansible to build and maintain Red Hat servers. We use it to ensure compliance with Security.
  • Configuration control.
  • Build configuration.
  • Security compliance.
  • Price.
  • Getting too complex.
It is well suited to ensure compliance with Security Regulations.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Currently used to patch, modify files required for configuration and also to grant sudo access to groups and users. To deploy software and remove it.
  • Patching
  • Software Deployment
  • Change across the board in no time
  • Documentation
  • Ease of integration with other products such as VMware
For patching large environments that do not require Redhat Satellite.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
I deploy Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform inside customer environments and write playbooks for customers that will be used inside the Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform.

Problems addressed are anything from configuration drift. Automating data backups on a random schedule.
  • Deploying templates
  • Manage templates
  • I like the platform
  • The UI has to be refreshed when jobs are running otherwise the logs aren't followed
I've used service now self-service portal to front-end requests from customers that then kick off Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform templates to complete the requests.
May 24, 2023

Automate This

Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Help customers automate repetitive functions and ensure consistent deployments
  • easy to read and understand code
  • essentially documents the environment
  • doesn't require an agent
  • inventory in AAP
  • blue green deployments from AAP
  • documentation has a lot of room for improvement
AAP is well suited for customers that need to automate their configuration but don't necessarily have a lot of in house expertise and would benefit from the support of Red Hat.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We us it to deploy ansible roles and playbooks, to configure our base endpoint of linux to end users. We use it to deploy 3rd party COTS apps, and DISA STIGs
  • deploys apps consistently
  • allows for scheduling jobs
  • allows for automation
  • prefer not to have to use an account
  • needs to have an agent
  • perform automare logging
Code correction,
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use AAP as our configuration management tool. We create and manage golden images and host the images in multiple cloud platforms for end user consumption. When an end user consumes/deploys one of our golden images, we use event detection to call AAP and finalize the hardening of the device. We also use AAP to manage configuration drift in the form of DSC.
  • Managing configuration drift
  • Playbook Formatting
  • Inventory/Variable Management (hierarchy)
  • Please re-add the running job ids to the browser tabs
  • Tracking multiple jobs running the same wf/job template
Ansible Automation Platform has been solid when applying STIG/CIS guidelines and is great for managing configuration drift.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Operating system server hardening on existing Vms. Azure and AWS cloud resource creation. Ansible playbooks for repeatable fixes. VM image creation and publishing and automation integration with other IT systems. We also use Ansible for data collection and ad-hoc executions across multiple network segments and environments. we use Ansible to deploy terraform jobs across azure and aws
  • Github integration using projects to tie code versions to templates
  • running the same automation code across one to many hosts
  • being able to automate almost anything, running powershell, terraform, python inside of Ansible plays.
  • Job template workflow decisions to do more than failed/success/all
  • RBAC for users, teams and orgs sometimes has differences in access roles.
  • better error handling/retries on connection problems, which typically force fail a play before code can execute
Ansible has been key to our success with server hardening as well as hardened image creations.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We currently use Ansible Automation Platform to deploy Java Springboot services onto RHEL. We recently began to use it to make changes to our Citrix Netscaler. There is a requirement that a change be made to a load balanced virtual server twice a day, once at 7am and once at 7pm. We wrote a playbook and scheduled it to keep a person from having to be available 7 days a week to make a simple change. Since then that group has begun to develop other playbooks to be able to create the entities on the Netscaler instead of creating them manually everytime.
  • Makes change configuration repeatable and consistant
  • Allows scheduled automation
  • Allows separation of duties and roles
  • Better integration with Automation Hub. It almost appears they're two separate products.
  • The ability to see the details of the individual processes within a workflow job
It is very good at working with any Linux system as well as many of the major products on the market. It's hard to work with Microsoft because of the many prerequisites needed on Windows servers. It can also be difficult to work with out of the box with systems that might require extra dependencies that need to be added to an Execution Environment to interact with.
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Network Automation
- Code upgrades, ZTP, integration with Operational tools
  • Stateful Knowledge of network
  • Parsing text
  • Integrating different platforms such as ITSM
It is well suited for repeated mundane tasks, that takes time but human intervention is not required
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform helped me configure virtual machines in research lab environments for my bachelor thesis.
This allowed a predefined configuration of Ubuntu hosts while resetting those after every lab assessment.
  • Easy to learn
  • Enables GitOps
  • More productivity due to time saved by automation
  • Inventory definition not intuitive
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is well suited for infrastructures with repeating patterns and processes.
But also for granular automation it can be used.

Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform automation can serve as a form of documentation.

There is almost no scenario where Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform makes no sense to use at all.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Build custom modules and roles for Dell infrastructure products for tasks like storage provisioning and server management. The modules and roles are available on Galaxy and the source code repos on GitHub. The modules help our customers do end to end automation for cloud-like operational agility. We also Create demos on how to use them.
  • Easy to create and manage YAML cook books
  • Agentless execution
  • Improved VS Code plugins
Configuration management and infrastructure as code.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform for patch management.
  • Desired state
  • Connectivity with other platforms
  • VM provisioning
  • Sometimes when SSH is not possible, Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform will not run. It would be nice if there were other connection methods.
  • Playbook writing.
  • Not optimized out-of-the-box. Would be nice if the Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform installer detected and customized the installation for the system the playbook is hosted on.
Patch management and desired state management.
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