Getting started with Ansible

Ansible automates the management of remote systems and controls their desired state.

Basic components of an Ansible environment include a control node, an inventory of managed nodes, and a module copied to each managed node.

As shown in the preceding figure, most Ansible environments have three main components:

Control node

A system on which Ansible is installed. You run Ansible commands such as ansible or ansible-inventory on a control node.

Inventory

A list of managed nodes that are logically organized. You create an inventory on the control node to describe host deployments to Ansible.

Managed node

A remote system, or host, that Ansible controls.