YAML is my Love Language.
June 05, 2023

YAML is my Love Language.

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Software Version

Enterprise

Modules Used

  • Ansible Tower

Overall Satisfaction with Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

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.
  • Enterprise-level automation that can support any platform.
  • Customizable static and dynamic inventories.
  • Audit logs.
  • Automatic VIP creation saves roughly 900 hours per year and turns a one-week SLA into near-instant completion.
  • Firewall Policy Automation has the potential to save 1300 hours annually and change a 3-day SLA to same-day turnaround and eventually near instant.
  • Data gathering for common requests saves hours of manual effort every day.

Do you think Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform's feature set?

Yes

Did Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform go as expected?

No

Would you buy Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform again?

Yes

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.