Red Hat Launches Ansible-Native Container Workflow Project

Community-powered Ansible Container enables complete container creation from Ansible Playbooks, reducing reliance on external Docker tools

RALEIGH, CAROLINE DU NORD -

Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE: RHT), the world's leading provider of open source solutions, today announced the launch of Ansible Container under the Ansible project, which provides the leading simple, powerful, and agentless open source IT automation framework. Available now as a technology preview, Ansible Container allows for the complete creation of Docker-formatted Linux containers within Ansible Playbooks, eliminating the need to use external tools like Dockerfile or docker-compose.

Icon-Red_Hat-Media_and_documents-Quotemark_Open-B-Red-RGB

Many users in our community have already grown accustomed to using Ansible to deploy and manage their containers, and the Ansible Container project is an encapsulation of many of the community’s best ideas, brought together into a single tool.

Greg Dekoenigsberg

director, Ansible community

While standardization is emerging for container formats in the form of the Open Container Initiative, the tooling space is still fragmented, with developers often forced to work outside of the enterprise workstream to create and deploy containerized applications. Ansible Container changes this dynamic, by bringing Linux container development into the existing workstream through the easy-to-consume Ansible Playbook, adding cloud-native application development side-by-side with traditional application building.

Alongside Ansible Container, the Ansible project has also launched new Kubernetes modules which allow for the production of Kubernetes templates directly from an Ansible playbook. Combining the two new offerings, IT teams can now build Linux containers directly from a playbook and deploy to a Kubernetes-based container application platform, like Red Hat OpenShift, in a more streamlined and efficient manner.

Ansible enables developers and IT operators to more easily and quickly deploy IT applications and environments, empowering them to remove barriers between IT teams by automating routine activities such as network configuration, cloud deployments, and creation of development environments. Ansible’s modular code base, combined with ease of contribution, and a community of contributors in GitHub, enables the powerful IT automation platform to manage today’s infrastructure, but also adapt to new IT needs and DevOps workflows.

With the capabilities of Ansible Container, users will be able to automate their existing infrastructure and networks with Ansible playbooks, while using additional playbooks to containerize their applications and deploy them on a container application platform. This allows for continuity of operations by preserving existing IT investments and critical applications/systems without sacrificing innovation in the form of cloud-native applications and container orchestration at scale.

The automated container creation and deployment offered by Ansible factor into Red Hat’s existing container infrastructure stack, which now includes:

  • A stable, container-centric operating system in Red Hat Enterprise Linux Atomic Host

  • An enterprise-grade, Kubernetes- and Docker-native container application platform through Red Hat OpenShift and the recently announced next-generation OpenShift Online public cloud service.

  • Infrastructure management, automation and monitoring across hybrid environments with Red Hat CloudForms, Red Hat Insights, Red Hat Satellite and Ansible Tower by Red Hat.

  • Massively-scalable private and hybrid cloud architecture for large-scale container deployments through Red Hat OpenStack Platform and Red Hat Cloud Suite, which also includes Red Hat OpenShift.

Red Hat’s container stack provides a fully-open, enterprise-grade experience, from developers building cloud native applications to operations teams managing and monitoring a diverse set of hybrid applications and environments. Built entirely from upstream, community-driven projects, Red Hat’s container portfolio provides the innovation to drive the next-generation of enterprise IT while also allowing for the retention of mission-critical modern and legacy systems.

For more details or to try it in its current form, visit the Ansible Container project.

Supporting Quote
Greg Dekoenigsberg, director, Ansible community

“Many users in our community have already grown accustomed to using Ansible to deploy and manage their containers, and the Ansible Container project is an encapsulation of many of the community’s best ideas, brought together into a single tool. The user traction we’ve received in a fairly short period of time indicates to us that we’re targeting a critical need in the container tooling space.”

  • About Red Hat
  • Red Hat is the world's leading provider of open source software solutions, using a community-powered approach to provide reliable and high-performing cloud, Linux, middleware, storage and virtualization technologies. Red Hat also offers award-winning support, training, and consulting services. As a connective hub in a global network of enterprises, partners, and open source communities, Red Hat helps create relevant, innovative technologies that liberate resources for growth and prepare customers for the future of IT. Learn more at http://www.redhat.com.



  • Forward-Looking Statements
  • Certain statements contained in this press release may constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements provide current expectations of future events based on certain assumptions and include any statement that does not directly relate to any historical or current fact. Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including: risks related to the ability of the Company to compete effectively; the ability to deliver and stimulate demand for new products and technological innovations on a timely basis; delays or reductions in information technology spending; the integration of acquisitions and the ability to market successfully acquired technologies and products; the effects of industry consolidation; uncertainty and adverse results in litigation and related settlements; the inability to adequately protect Company intellectual property and the potential for infringement or breach of license claims of or relating to third party intellectual property; risks related to data and information security vulnerabilities; ineffective management of, and control over, the Company's growth and international operations; fluctuations in exchange rates; and changes in and a dependence on key personnel, as well as other factors contained in our most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K (copies of which may be accessed through the Securities and Exchange Commission's website at http://www.sec.gov), including those found therein under the captions "Risk Factors" and "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations". In addition to these factors, actual future performance, outcomes, and results may differ materially because of more general factors including (without limitation) general industry and market conditions and growth rates, economic and political conditions, governmental and public policy changes and the impact of natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods. The forward-looking statements included in this press release represent the Company's views as of the date of this press release and these views could change. However, while the Company may elect to update these forward-looking statements at some point in the future, the Company specifically disclaims any obligation to do so. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing the Company's views as of any date subsequent to the date of this press release.