Ansible on Blog - uTIcARdI

Ansible-Access Network via Netconf

Thu, 11 Oct 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Continue to try ansible with the device which was configure in netconf feature on Cisco IOS/IOSXE.

Ansible Inventory:

---
netconf:
hosts:
 netconfIos:
 ansible_host: "172.16.254.100"
 ansible_network_os: "ios"
 ansible_ssh_port: 22
 netconfJunos:
 ansible_host: "172.16.254.9"
 ansible_network_os: "junos"
 ansible_ssh_port: 830
vars:
 ansible_connection: "netconf"
 ansible_ssh_user: test
 ansible_ssh_pass: test123

Note:

ansible_connnection should be ‘netconf’
Be careful on the netconf port, it should be 22 if you enable netconf over SSH (the default port is 830)

PlayBook:

- name: IOS
hosts: netconfIos
gather_facts: false
tasks:
 - name: Get config for IOS devices
 netconf_get:
 source: running
 register: iosnetconf

 - name: Display output
 debug:
 msg: "{{ iosnetconf.stdout }}"

Note:

Netconf feature on Cisco IOS/IOSXE

Sun, 07 Oct 2018 00:00:00 +0000

I tried to see how Ansible works with the netconf feature on Cisco and Juniper in past days: Juniper’s official document is clear and easy to follow. but for Cisco, I followed NETCONF over SSHv2, unfortunately, I was stuck on it for 6 days.

OS Version

Cisco IOS XE Software, Version 16.04.01
Cisco IOS Software, Linux Software (I86BI_LINUXL2-IPBASEK9-M), Experimental Version 15.2(20170809:194209) [dstivers-aug9_]

NetConf Requests

Tried many requests, all failed:

The hello (works) request:

Ansible-Access Network via SSH

Tue, 04 Sep 2018 00:00:00 +0000

After Telnet, continue to discuss how to access network device via SSH with Ansible.

For SSH access, we should consider 3 methods:

Username/password
Username/Public-Key without password
Username/Public-Key with password

Same EVE lab as the Telnet one: The Cisco IOS Router-192.168.1.99 is for SSH

Topo

Enable SSH on the router

Jump #1 username/password part to public key configuration, I discussed how to configure public key on IOS router with Putty before, instead of windows/putty, openssh is useful for generating keys on MAC OS.

Ansible-Access Network via Telnet

Tue, 04 Sep 2018 00:00:00 +0000

I’m learning Ansible by reading the official document and some books like Ansible入门. Most of the instructions show you how to deploy or maintain the services on Linux, or file operations. But what I do is trying to explore its capability on network device management automation.

The most important thing to practice routers/switches/routing protocol is accessing the device and configure it via CLI when I started to learn network, so I start my ansible tour by accessing the network device from CLI too.

Run Ansible on Windows

Tue, 29 Nov 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Background:

Here is a topology about the environment for performance testing, let’s name the servers 1st:

1 windows server as the License/Workspace server
5 windows servers as the Network Server
5 windows servers as the Automation server

Topo

It took us a lot of time to deploy the product and collect logs on all of these servers.