WEBVTT

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 Welcome to this video, which is called
 an overview of network automation

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 tools. So for our CCNA boot camp series
 here, this will be our last topic

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 under the umbrella of network programmability
 and automation.

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 So I've mentioned already that these,
 that there are tools and we, in

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 a previous video, I gave you just real
 quickly some names of them like

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 Ansible, Chef, Puppet,
 Salt, Stack.

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 And I said, the main goal of these
 tools is to be able to automate the

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 configuration of your devices.

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 They can also reach out to devices, see
 what their existing configuration

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 is, and if their existing configuration
 does not match what we would consider

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 a golden config, and a golden company,
 every switch should have VLANs

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 one through five, every switch should
 be running rapid spanning tree.

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 That's what we've decided
 is the best practice.

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 Well network automation tool could
 reach out to all my switches.

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 Maybe I would program it to do that
 like every day at 5 AM, retrieve the

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 configuration, and see if the configuration
 has VLANs one through five,

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 and if it's running
 rapid spanning tree.

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 If it's not, that network automation
 tool could then be programmed to

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 reach back into the switch that's not
 doing that and program it to do

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 that. So the main idea here is that
 we're removing the dependencies of

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 box by box CLI management.

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 We don't want to have to log in to each
 switch each router one at a time

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 like we've had to do for dozens of years
 and program them each independently.

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 We want an automation tool
 to do that for us.

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 Okay, so just going to give a real high level
 overview here of these configuration

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 management tools.

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 For the purposes of the CCNA exam, you
 should be able to recognize these

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 names as being network
 automation tools.

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 You should recognize that that's
 what their purpose is.

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 Okay, so there are some similarities
 between these.

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 Number one, all these tools require some
 sort of CLI or scripting knowledge.

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 Oh my gosh, you mean I
 gotta learn scripting?

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 Yes, unfortunately you do, at least
 if you're going to work with one of

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 these puppies. So some of them
 are very similar to Cisco iOS.

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 And a lot of times you can go on to websites
 and you can see example scripts

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 that came with the tool.

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 You can say, oh, I see how
 that was put together.

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 So if I just erase that IP address there
 in the sample and put in my own

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 IP address, I can get it to work.

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 And yes, you absolutely could.

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 Some are like totally out there
 and totally different.

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 And they use scripting languages
 like Yamal and Ruby.

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 I have no idea how
 that stuff works.

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 Good luck to you if you do.

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 Some of those tools also have a GUI
 component as well, which makes life

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 useful. And you can use the GUI to
 schedule automated tasks, manually

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 instantiate events.

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 And typically the associated GUI, if
 there is one, will reference that

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 script that you created with Yamal or
 Ruby or something along those natures.

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 Okay, so here's some differences
 between these tools.

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 Some network automation tools, you will
 download and install unlike your

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 Linux server or something.

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 And then you'll create a script
 using whatever language it uses.

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 And in that script, you'll probably
 identify, you know, the IP address

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 of switch one, the IP address of router
 five, so it knows where all the

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 devices are. You'll provide like the
 login credentials that will need

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 to log into all those devices.

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 And then you type a command
 to get to start.

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 And that tool can just reach out just
 like you were on secure CRT or putty

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 or hyper terminal or something.

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 And it can reach into those devices and
 start configuring them and reading

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 them. And you can just program it to
 do that like every day at five AM

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 or something. So that case, that
 tool is like a standalone tool.

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 Other tools like we see here
 require two components.

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 They have the server aspect that you download
 unlike the server or something.

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 But then they also have another component
 that you actually have to install

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 in your networking device itself.

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 Now let me pause here
 for a moment.

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 All of these network automation tools,
 they were not originally developed

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 to automate routers and switches and
 network infrastructure things.

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 They can nowadays, but that wasn't
 their original intent.

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 As a matter of fact, a lot of these
 tools, their original intent was to

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 work with servers.

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 Specifically, imagine an environment
 where you have virtual machines and

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 you've got some server that's got
 a bunch of virtual machines in it.

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 And you need some automated tool that
 will automatically at a certain

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 time every day, check to see if certain
 virtual machines are running,

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 create virtual machines on the fly,
 delete existing virtual machines,

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 look at the configuration of virtual
 machines in your VMware environment.

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 That is what these tools were
 originally designed to do.

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 Not work with Cisco router switches and
 firewalls, but they've been upgraded

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 and changed over time so they can do
 that as well work with your network

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 infrastructure. So when I say that
 some tools require a master and an

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 agent where the master would be, okay,
 I've downloaded this network automation

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 tool on my Linux server and then you
 need an agent, which is running in

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 your device and it will
 respond to the master.

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 Well, if the, you know, remember, this
 was designed that the agent would

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 be installed on your VM, you know, your
 VM running Linux or your VM running

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 a virtualized router or something like
 that, just another software component.

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 But a lot of routers and switches out
 there don't allow you to install

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 an agent. Like think of your common
 Cisco router or switch.

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 Can you go onto your router or
 switch and install notepad?

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 Can you install secure CRT?

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 Can you install anything on it?

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 No, it's a self-contained box of a CLI
 and that's all it is really meant

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 for. Well, that type of box would not
 be a good candidate for a network

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 automation tool that uses
 masters and agents.

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 But other Cisco devices, like some of
 our newer iOS, XE devices and stuff,

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 do allow you to install the agent component
 of these automation tools.

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 Okay, so depending on the names, they
 have different names, different

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 terminology. So for example, puppet
 has a concept of a puppet master,

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 kind of cool puppet master, right?


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 That's the server, the Linux server that's
 reaching out to all the devices

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 and puppet agents.

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 So if you want to use puppet to manage
 your network infrastructure, all

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 your router switches, firewalls, they
 have to have the ability to install

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 a puppet agent on them.

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 Chef also has a master
 agent, salt stack.

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 This one's kind of funny.

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 Master and minions must install the binions
 on your routers and switches.

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 All right, something else that differentiates
 these network automation

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 tools from each other.

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 So is whether or not they
 use a push or pull model.

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 So if I'm talking about a network automation
 tool that does not use masters

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 and agents. So for example, a network
 automation tool that I can just

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 load it onto my Linux server.

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 Like I said, give it the IP addresses
 of my devices, give it the SSH login

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 credentials, and then it can
 just reach out to them.

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 That would be called a push model.


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 That network automation tool is
 pushing down to those devices.

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 What I want to do is
 pushing the config.

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 That's the push model.

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 And ancable and salt
 stack are like that.

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 So honestly, if you're not, let's
 just focus on Cisco for a moment.

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 If your network is composed mostly
 of just regular iOS mainline Cisco

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 devices that don't allow you to install
 an agent, don't allow you to install

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 anything. You're probably going to want
 to use one of these two, ancable

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 or salt stack. Now the pull model
 is one where you have an agent.

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 And the agent will actually pull the
 master and say, Hey master, what

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 should I look like right now?

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 What should my config be?

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 Has anything changed since
 the last time I pulled it?

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 Oh, the last time I pulled you, you
 said I should have VLAN five.

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 Now I'm pulling you and you're
 saying I should have VLAN nine.

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 Oh, okay, I need to do that.

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 That's the pole.

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 That's the pole model.

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 And puppet and chef rely on that.

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 Creating configuration files.

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 So this is another big differentiator
 between this network automation

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 tools. Do you want to learn scripting
 or do you want to try to stay away

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 from scripting as if your
 life depended on it?

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 Well, so ancable and salt,
 salt stack utilize yaml.

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 Now I don't know, I know yaml stands
 for yet another markup language.

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 I know that. And I've done some real
 brief Googling and stuff on yaml.

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 And from what I can see, yaml is a pretty
 human readable scripting language.

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 It looks like it wouldn't take a lot
 of time to understand how yaml is

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 formatted and put a yaml script together
 that could do what you need to

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 do to, you know, program around a static
 route or program spanning tree

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 or something. So this is a
 lot more complex than yaml.

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 And this is why a lot of people prefer
 ancable and salt stack because

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 they don't want to have to learn
 Ruby or how Ruby works.

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 So in puppet, the configuration
 file is called a manifest.

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 And here's a great article
 that you can look up.

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 If you're curious about some more, the
 differences between puppet, chef,

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 ancable and salt stack.

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 This is actually where I got a lot
 of the information for this video.

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 All right, now let's just finish up
 with some, some unique terms that

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 are unique for each
 one of these things.

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 Let's start out with puppet.

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 So I've mentioned with puppet, you've
 got the puppet master and the puppet

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 agents. So the puppet master master
 is the puppet software that's loaded

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 on your like your Linux server.

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 The puppet agent is software as a software
 component that would be loaded

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 into your router into your
 switch into your firewall.

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 If that device allows
 you to do so.

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 There are things called puppet modules,
 which give providers and types.

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 And let's just talk about
 puppet manifest.

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 So the puppet manifest is the file you
 create with your desired configuration

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 statements. So when you're thinking
 about, okay, this is what I want.

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 And remember puppet has a
 master and agent, right?

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 So this is that poll model.

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 This is where the agent is going to
 poll the puppet master every once

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 in a while and say, okay, this is what
 my config file looks like right

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 now. Puppet master, what's my config
 file supposed to look like?

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 Well, that config file that it's polling
 for was configured as a puppet

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 manifest. Puppet forge, this is basically
 like a website where it's got

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 sample manifest.

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 It's got code you can download.

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 So if you're interested in puppet,
 you want to learn more about it.

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 I would definitely recommend that you
 Google puppet forge and you look

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 for that. So here's an example
 of a puppet manifest.

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 So you can see it is pretty
 human readable.

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 It makes sense when
 you read through it.

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 All right, what about chef?

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 So we have our chef server, which is your
 center of operations that stores,

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 manages and provides
 configuration data.

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 You've got your chef workstations.


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 So with chef, it breaks it up into two
 different components, workstations

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 and nodes. So a chef workstation would
 be like your laptop, your PC, where

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 you're creating your
 configuration code.

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 You're creating your
 configuration files.

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 And the chef node is an actual server
 that's talking to the workstation.

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 So it's like two different devices
 are talking to each other.

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 So changes are pushed from the
 workstation to the server.

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 And then pulled from the
 server to the node.

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 Lot of this stuff.

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 Don't worry about it.

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 You don't have to know
 this at the CC level.

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 Chef cookbooks and recipes.

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 Okay. So a chef cookbook is a data
 construct that allows chef to know

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 how it's going to
 talk to a device.

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 So for example, if I want chef to talk
 to a Cisco device, okay, my chef

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 cookbook might include like,
 okay, you need SSH.

0:14:07.120000 --> 0:14:08.920000
 Here's the SSH parameters.

0:14:08.920000 --> 0:14:10.760000
 You're going to need to supply
 it and able password.

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 You know, what are, how is chef going
 to know how to talk to my Cisco

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 device and how is that going to be
 different than the chef is going to

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 talk to my Juniper device
 or my Rista device?

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 That's the chef cookbook.

0:14:22.400000 --> 0:14:30.420000
 And then a chef recipe is where your
 actual configuration elements are.

0:14:30.420000 --> 0:14:35.260000
 So for example, you would create a chef
 recipe to allow chef to know how

0:14:35.260000 --> 0:14:41.640000
 to create a VLAN, how to shut down
 a port, how to configure OSPF.

0:14:41.640000 --> 0:14:44.320000
 That would be in the recipe.

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 So your cookbook would say, I, so you
 go into a chef and you say, I want

0:14:48.200000 --> 0:14:52.160000
 to pull up the, oh, the Cisco cookbook,
 which tells it how to ask you

0:14:52.160000 --> 0:14:55.960000
 access Cisco. And then you would say,
 within the Cisco cookbook, I want

0:14:55.960000 --> 0:15:01.160000
 to pull up the OSPF recipe or the spanning
 tree recipe, which will allow

0:15:01.160000 --> 0:15:06.140000
 chef to know how to configure those
 components of your Cisco device.

0:15:06.140000 --> 0:15:09.560000
 Main takeaway here, what do you
 need to know for the exam?

0:15:09.560000 --> 0:15:14.300000
 You need to know that chef uses these
 terms of cookbooks and recipes.

0:15:14.300000 --> 0:15:15.800000
 That's really what you
 got to focus in.

0:15:15.800000 --> 0:15:18.320000
 You don't have to know what the differences
 are between a cookbook and

0:15:18.320000 --> 0:15:21.020000
 a recipe. Just know that
 those are chef terms.

0:15:21.020000 --> 0:15:24.540000
 And here's more information
 about chef.

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 If you want to dig into this.

0:15:26.600000 --> 0:15:35.220000
 And here's an example of a chef recipe,
 what that would look like.

0:15:35.220000 --> 0:15:38.600000
 You can see we have a couple
 of them here for OSPF.

0:15:38.600000 --> 0:15:43.580000
 Well, actually all of these relate
 to OSPF and configuring OSPF VRFs,

0:15:43.580000 --> 0:15:46.300000
 configuring OSPF on an interface.

0:15:46.300000 --> 0:15:54.660000
 So this is a little bit more cryptic
 than what we previously saw with

0:15:54.660000 --> 0:16:01.460000
 puppet. All right, Ansible.

0:16:01.460000 --> 0:16:04.020000
 This has the Ansible master.

0:16:04.020000 --> 0:16:06.620000
 This is the guy you're probably going
 to want to use because this doesn't

0:16:06.620000 --> 0:16:08.080000
 require any kind of agent.

0:16:08.080000 --> 0:16:13.140000
 This doesn't require anything special
 running on the router or the switch.

0:16:13.140000 --> 0:16:17.500000
 Ansible is going to use SSH to
 connect to managed devices.

0:16:17.500000 --> 0:16:22.940000
 And it utilizes Ansible playbooks
 and Ansible modules.

0:16:22.940000 --> 0:16:35.200000
 Okay, so a playbook is similar in chef
 to how do I connect to a device?

0:16:35.200000 --> 0:16:37.820000
 What's the uniqueness
 of a Cisco device?

0:16:37.820000 --> 0:16:44.000000
 I need to know to connect to that
 versus an HP or a Juniper device.

0:16:44.000000 --> 0:16:49.280000
 And an Ansible module is that's where
 you would actually find your iOS

0:16:49.280000 --> 0:16:53.060000
 command. So if we're talking about Cisco,
 your iOS commands to configure

0:16:53.060000 --> 0:17:04.860000
 Spanning Tree to configure OSPF, that
 will be found in your Ansible module.

0:17:04.860000 --> 0:17:10.440000
 And here is an example of what
 an Ansible module looks like.

0:17:10.440000 --> 0:17:16.220000
 You can see probably of all the ones
 we've looked at, this one is probably

0:17:16.220000 --> 0:17:20.860000
 the most human readable
 of all of them.

0:17:20.860000 --> 0:17:26.560000
 Okay, so that concludes our review
 of network automation tools.