#1 most frequent
United States of America
39.8%15,509 installations of 38,925
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.
Categories & Use Cases
Product Demos
Who Buys & Uses Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform
#1 most frequent
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services
29.7%11,567 installations of 38,885
“We use Red Hat Ansible Automation to automate our critical IT routine tasks, such as configuration management, patch deployment, server configuration, and software installation (e.g., Datadog, Python, and AWS CLI) across our multi-server infrastructure.”
#2 most frequent
Information
17.3%6,726 installations of 38,885
“HashiCorp Terraform, GitHub, Harness”
#3 most frequent
Finance and Insurance
9.5%3,695 installations of 38,885
“I have used Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform since 2017 for network infrastructure and network security automation.”
#2 most frequent
India
7.6%2,939 installations of 38,925
#3 most frequent
Germany
5.8%2,249 installations of 38,925
Pros
- Automating a wide array of IT operations, including business processes and application deployments
- Robust configuration management for consistency and mitigating configuration drift
- Ease of use and readability provided by intuitive interface and YAML syntax
Cons
- UI/GUI requires modernization and improved in-platform playbook editing
- Documentation and training materials are often difficult to find or follow
- Credential management needs better handling of password strings and third-party integration
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform and Infrastructure are a Match
Use Cases and Deployment Scope
I have used Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform since 2017 for network infrastructure and network security automation. I have built solutions for several use cases including network compliance and self healing, F5 VIP building self-service, Firewall Policy automation, and several smaller use cases. We have many complex automation workflows that integrate with other platforms like Jenkins, GitHub, ServiceNow, and plenty of others.
Pros
- Standardize controls and visibility for automation.
- Provide RBAC and Vault for improved automation security and support.
- Job Scheduling is much more effective than Cron or other home-grown solutions.
- The Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform API is one of the best features as it makes automation accessible from any other platform.
Cons
- Testing Framework to perform CICD-like functionality for Ansible Playbooks, Workflows, and Collections.
- Built-in development tools allowing testing playbook runs within a VENV or EE on the CLI directly or within an IDE. The challenge being that Ansible is not always available for direct installation on a user laptop for security reasons.
- Could use improvement on standards for modules to provide better feedback from the underlying language (Python) for easier troubleshooting and support.
Return on Investment
- A 45min manual process to build VIPs with a SLA of 1 week can now be completed as self-service within 10 minutes in production.
- Firewall Policy ranges in review and implementation time depending on complexity of requests. Our policy automation is able to provide detailed and accurate decisioning information that allows the operations team to approve requests and have them automatically implemented within minutes. Not only does this free up Ops for more important efforts, but it opens access many times quicker which allows much faster time to market.
Usability
Scalable platform that stabilizes workflows and automations
Use Cases and Deployment Scope
I like how the Red Hat Ansible Automation platform allows my team to automate tasks across on-premise and cloud environments. The platform centralises everything to streamline workflows and enhance efficient team collaboration. One of the great milestones that we have achieved as software development team is how we have been able to scale down our daily tasks with simplified infrastructure.
Pros
- Automation of tasks
- Streamlining workflows across different environments
- Secure data virtualization
Cons
- The graphics needs to be improved for better workflow enhancement.
- The AAP lacks underlying OIDC configurations.
Return on Investment
- Automation of tasks has enhanced positive ROI and reduced cost of production.
- Administration of application development with server configuration has enhanced effective workflows.
Usability
Other Software Used
Perplexity, SurveyMonkey, Miro
Exploring the Ease of Use and Automation Capabilities of Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform.
Use Cases and Deployment Scope
We use Red Hat Ansible Automation to automate our critical IT routine tasks, such as configuration management, patch deployment, server configuration, and software installation (e.g., Datadog, Python, and AWS CLI) across our multi-server infrastructure. Previously, these tasks took days or weeks to complete manually, but now run automatically, freeing us to focus on higher-value workflows. For example, when we need to patch many of our servers, this tool automatically deploys updates across all our systems instead of us doing it manually, which not only reduces human error but also keeps everything consistent, eliminating having different configurations which can cause issues later. Also it automate day to day health checks by scanning servers on schedule and generating reports that help us to know which systems are secure and which need addressing. Because it works across all our environments, it allows us to manage everything centrally without switching multiple platforms.
Pros
- Automation purposes which eliminates human error.
- Managing all configuration consistency between all servers.
- Managing application deployment.
- Automating security compliance tasks and network.
- Patch management.
- Routine health checks.
- Report generation.
Cons
- Doesn't offer ease integration with secret vault like CyberArk.
- The technical support services need significant improvement, as users have had a poor experience.
- Also needs improvement by creating modules for upcoming AI and ML technologies, as this capability is missing.
Return on Investment
- First, it keeps our entire server infrastructure aligned with our standards and reduces the time and effort needed to maintain our systems.
- Automate routine IT tasks to save time, reduce errors, and ensure every server is configured and updated consistently.
- Tasks that used to take our teams weeks to complete manually now run automatically and reliably, with full visibility, making our infrastructure management more effective and our compliance tracking much easier.
Usability
Alternatives Considered
Microsoft Intune
Other Software Used
Jira Service Management, Datadog, Microsoft Azure
Red Hat [...]
Use Cases and Deployment Scope
Configuration Management and STIG Requirements for environment systems. Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform allows the automation of processes that can take hours and allows team members to be free and work on others tasks while Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is doing the work in the background after the launch is submitted. Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform allows work to flow seamless and effective on day to day tasks.
Pros
- Automated updates
- STIG requirements
- Pushing products to a mass of systems
Return on Investment
- Positive impact has been lessening the footprint of our building and automating most of the tasks
Usability
Alternatives Considered
Red Hat Satellite and Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
Other Software Used
Red Hat Satellite, Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
Requires up-front work but delivers in spades
Use Cases and Deployment Scope
We use Ansible Automation Platform to perform various maintenance operations on our RHEL servers. A major use case is the deployment of new servers (on-premise VMs) and applying standard configuration.
Pros
- Deploying a new VM from scratch
- Applying a standard software stack
- Analyze current environment
Cons
- If a machine is not already in an inventory, a template (playbook, role) cannot be applied. There is no easy way to give it an ad-hoc list of hosts at run-time.
- It does not remove the need to create YAML files. We could have wider adoption (e.g. among Windows server admins) by having a GUI for creating basic workflows.
- Getting a profile (job) to run right can take a lot of trial and error. Some 'static analysis' tools built into the web interface would be helpful.
- We sometimes run into dependency errors on the target hosts related to their Python environment.
Return on Investment
- New server deployments that once took a week or more now take under an hour.
- RHEL server configuration is far more consistent.
- Responding to security advisories is no longer a source of panic; it's routine.
Usability
Alternatives Considered
Open Source Puppet
Other Software Used
Red Hat Satellite, Red Hat Lightspeed, Apache Solr
