2_awx_install.md

Ansible AWX Guide: from scratch to REST API (2/8)

AWX Installation on Docker Compose

This topic is about how to install Ansible AWX on Docker Compose.

Nowadays the most applications are container-based design, Ansible AWX has support to multiple deployment types such as OpenShift, Kubernetes, Minishift, and Docker Compose.

Table of Contents

• Concepts
• System Requirements
• Prerequisites
• Setup Docker
• Setup Firewall
• Download and Setup AWX
• Summary
• References

Concepts

What is Docker Compose

Compose is a tool for defining and running multi-container Docker applications. With Compose, you use a YAML file to configure your application’s services. Then, with a single command, you create and start all the services from your configuration. To learn more about all the features of Compose, see the list of features. ¹

System Requirements

The system requirements for Ansible AWX deployment on Docker Compose. ²

• At least 4GB of memory;
• At least 2 cpu cores;
• At least 20GB of space.

Prerequisites

Install docker-ce repository.

curl https://download.docker.com/linux/centos/docker-ce.repo -o /etc/yum.repos.d/docker-ce.repo

Install EPEL repository.

dnf -y install https://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/epel-release-latest-8.noarch.rpm

Install packages.

dnf -y install python3-pip git docker-ce ansible --nobest

Install docker-compose.

pip3 install docker-compose

Setup Docker

Enable and start docker service.

systemctl enable --now docker

Create a exclusive network for Docker Compose.

docker network create --opt com.docker.network.bridge.name=awxcompose0 awxcompose

Setup Firewall

Allow the following firewall policies.

firewall-cmd --zone=trusted --add-interface=awxcompose0 --permanent
firewall-cmd --zone=trusted --add-interface=awxcompose0
firewall-cmd --add-service=http --add-service=https --permanent
firewall-cmd --add-service=http --add-service=https

Download and Setup AWX

Get AWX source code.

git clone https://github.com/ansible/awx

Change directory.

cd awx/installer/

Define Docker Compose network to be used by template.

cat << EOF >> roles/local_docker/templates/docker-compose.yml.j2

networks:
  default:
    external:
      name: awxcompose
EOF

Define AWX admin password.

sed -E -i 's|^(#)?admin_password=.*|admin_password=mypassword|g' inventory

Create SSL certificate.

mkdir -vp ~/.awx/ssl

openssl req -subj \
  '/C=BR/ST=Sao Paulo/L=Sao Paulo/O=AWX Example/OU=IT/CN=awx.example.com/[email protected]' \
  -new -nodes -x509 -days 365 -newkey rsa:2048 \
  -keyout ~/.awx/ssl/awx.key \
  -out ~/.awx/ssl/awx.crt

cat ~/.awx/ssl/awx.crt ~/.awx/ssl/awx.key >> ~/.awx/ssl/awx.pem

Adjust inventory for SSL certificate.

sed -E -i 's|^(#)?ssl_certificate=.*|ssl_certificate="~/.awx/ssl/awx.pem"|g' inventory

You can adjust other parameters, check inventory file. By default the user's home directory is the default path for storing container files, as well as for the PostgreSQL database.

grep -Ev '^$|^#' inventory

Run Ansible Playbook to configure AWX.

ansible-playbook -i inventory -e ansible_python_interpreter=python3 install.yml

Wait for playbook to finish.

While containers are initializing, index page remains in status "AWX is Upgrading", that page will be automatically refreshed and redirected to login page, then it will be able to accept user credentials.

NOTE: it's strongly recommended to use Safari or Firefox browsers, recent Chrome version does not work due self-signed certificate.

Summary

In this topic was presented:

• Installing AWX prerequisites;
• Download and setup Ansible AWX for Docker Compose deployment on CentOS 8.

References

[1] - https://docs.docker.com/compose/

[2] - https://github.com/ansible/awx/blob/devel/INSTALL.md

Continue Reading

Next topic: Managing AWX using REST API, CLI and Web UI

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