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      <p>Let's start at the beginning.</p>

      <p>If we want to automate our infrastructure then we first need to create it. This could be done manually or we can automate it.</p>

      <p>Popular tools for this include Terraform and Pulumi, but Ansible also includes modules to interface with hosting providers such as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, DigitalOcean, and Linode.</p>

      <p>By using one of these tools, you can programatically provision a new, blank server that is ready for you to be configered.</p>

      <p>For example, to <a href="https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/latest/collections/community/digitalocean/digital_ocean_module.htm">create a DigitalOcean droplet</a>:</p>

      <pre><code class="language-yaml">--- - community.digitalocean.digital_ocean_droplet:
          image: ubuntu-20-04-x64
          name: mydroplet
          oauth_token: "..."
          region: sfo3
          size: s-1vcpu-1gb
          ssh_keys: [ .... ]
          state: present
          wait_timeout: 500
        register: my_droplet
      </code></pre>

      <p>Running this playbook will create a new Droplet with the specified name, size, and operating system, and within the specified region.</p>

      <p>If you needed to create a separate database server or another server for a new environment, then the file can be updated and re-run.</p>

      <p><a href="https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/latest/collections/amazon/aws/ec2_instance_module.html#ansible-collections-amazon-aws-ec2-instance-module">Creating an Amazon EC2 instance</a> looks very similar:</p>

      <pre><code class="language-yaml">--- - amazon.aws.ec2_instance:
          image_id: ami-123456
          instance_type: c5.large
          key_name: "prod-ssh-key"
          name: "public-compute-instance"
          network:
            assign_public_ip: true
          security_group: default
          vpc_subnet_id: subnet-5ca1ab1e
      </code></pre>

      <p>This doesn't apply just to servers - you can also use Ansible to create security groups and S3 buckets, manage SSH keys, firewalls, and load balancers.</p>

      <p>Once we have our infrastructure in place, we can start using Ansible to set and manage its configuration, which we'll do in tomorrow's email.</p>

      <hr />

      <p>Want to learn more about how I use Ansible? <a href="/ansible-course">Register for my upcoming free email course</a>.</p>

              
    format: full_html
    processed: |
      <p>Let's start at the beginning.</p>

      <p>If we want to automate our infrastructure then we first need to create it. This could be done manually or we can automate it.</p>

      <p>Popular tools for this include Terraform and Pulumi, but Ansible also includes modules to interface with hosting providers such as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, DigitalOcean, and Linode.</p>

      <p>By using one of these tools, you can programatically provision a new, blank server that is ready for you to be configered.</p>

      <p>For example, to <a href="https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/latest/collections/community/digitalocean/digital_ocean_module.htm">create a DigitalOcean droplet</a>:</p>

      <pre><code class="language-yaml">--- - community.digitalocean.digital_ocean_droplet:
          image: ubuntu-20-04-x64
          name: mydroplet
          oauth_token: "..."
          region: sfo3
          size: s-1vcpu-1gb
          ssh_keys: [ .... ]
          state: present
          wait_timeout: 500
        register: my_droplet
      </code></pre>

      <p>Running this playbook will create a new Droplet with the specified name, size, and operating system, and within the specified region.</p>

      <p>If you needed to create a separate database server or another server for a new environment, then the file can be updated and re-run.</p>

      <p><a href="https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/latest/collections/amazon/aws/ec2_instance_module.html#ansible-collections-amazon-aws-ec2-instance-module">Creating an Amazon EC2 instance</a> looks very similar:</p>

      <pre><code class="language-yaml">--- - amazon.aws.ec2_instance:
          image_id: ami-123456
          instance_type: c5.large
          key_name: "prod-ssh-key"
          name: "public-compute-instance"
          network:
            assign_public_ip: true
          security_group: default
          vpc_subnet_id: subnet-5ca1ab1e
      </code></pre>

      <p>This doesn't apply just to servers - you can also use Ansible to create security groups and S3 buckets, manage SSH keys, firewalls, and load balancers.</p>

      <p>Once we have our infrastructure in place, we can start using Ansible to set and manage its configuration, which we'll do in tomorrow's email.</p>

      <hr>

      <p>Want to learn more about how I use Ansible? <a href="/ansible-course">Register for my upcoming free email course</a>.</p>

              
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