Tag: SaltStack

By mfitzgerald

What is Jenkins?

Jenkins is an open-source software written in Java and Scala. This software allows users the ability to automate almost any task and, it saves significant time that can be better utilized addressing other issues. When automating tasks with Jenkins, users can optimize their workflow by quickly automating the jobs that servers cannot do themselves. In this tutorial, we will learn how to install Jenkins on CentOS 8. We will also explore what its purpose is and share several benefits that Jenkins offers. We will then configure it to run on our CentOS 8 server.

Ansible is an open-source tool that uses playbooks to enable configuration management, software provisioning, and application deployment. It is primarily written in Python and was released in 2012. Ever since then, it has saved countless hours of often menial work of deploying and maintaining IT infrastructure. Overall, Ansible is very consistent, secure, reliable, and it requires a minimal learning curve. Simply put, Ansible is a powerful tool for automating apps and infrastructure. You can read more about general Ansible information in our recently published article.

Introduction: What is IaC?

Today we will become acquainted with a concept known as Infrastructure as Code. The idea of Infrastructure as Code is becoming more and more popular today. IaC is a method used to manage and provision a data center via defined machine-readable files instead of physical hardware configuration or other interactive configuration tools. This article will share what it is used for, why it is important, and why businesses strive to utilize this platform to achieve a desired set of results. It is essential to understand that we will consider both the theoretical and practical parts of IaC.

What is DevOps?

DevOps is a set of various tools, practices, and ideals that combine software development (Dev) and IT Operations (Ops) into a single unifying force. It allows for better collaboration between developers, operations teams, system administrators, and system engineers. Their streamlined goal is to continually provide a high-value software product to the customer at high speed while monitoring and improving the overall process than using traditional software and infrastructure management. 

Introduction

Ansible is a system of configuration management written in Python programming language which uses a declarative markup language to describe configurations. It’s used for automation of configuration and OS setup. Ansible is often used to manage Linux-nodes, but Windows is also supported. It supports work with devices with Python v2.4 and higher installed through SSH connection. In this article, we are going to review the DevOps tool called Ansible.    

What is SaltStack?

SaltStack is an open-source infrastructure management platform built on a dynamic communications bus. The main structure of SaltStack contains two main components for work: one Salt Master and several Salt Minions. Salt Master is the main control system used to send commands to Salt Minion and their configuration. Salt Minions (they are also called Nodes) are subsystems that work on managed servers and receive commands from the master, as well as their configuration. At least two servers are required for interaction settings. One for the Master and one for the node. All nodes are configured in the same way.

Which one is appropriate for you?

Table of Contents

I. Puppet
II. SaltStack
III. Chef
IV. Ansible
IV. Conclusion

Introduction

Configuring a single server with the required software is a reasonably simple task. However, if numerous servers need to have the same or similar software and configurations installed on them, the process would use numerous man-hours to complete, which would deplete your already strained resources. Without some form of automation, this task can become nearly insurmountable. With this task in mind, new configuration management tools were developed to address the need to deploy new servers with premade configurations and updates, that allowed for a smoother and more manageable automation process. To keep these servers syncing and to manage updates across a broad swath of hosts in a data center or cloud environment, automation tools like Puppet, SaltStack, Chef, and Ansible meet this need.

What Is Jenkins?

Jenkins is an open source automation server software developed in Java. It allows developers to integrate CI/CD (Continuous Integration/Continuous Delivery) pipelines within their organization that ease and automate workflows. It has an extensive help community, supports over 1000 plugins, allows users the ability to automate almost any task and, it saves significant time that can be better utilized addressing other issues.