Get Ansible to wait_for ssh

Whilst writing a follow-up to my last post, I noticed that Ansible was failing to connect to a newly spun up Linux server on the Rackspace Cloud and spent a bit of time troubleshooting the connection. All articles I've read using Rackspace & Ansible didn't mention much about ssh connection timeouts so I thought I'd put this together.

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Spin up a Rackspace Cloud Server with Ansible

Ansible is a configuration management, provisioning and work flow automation tool that is written in python. I've been playing around with for a little while and it's a rather refreshing change from the other configuration management tools I've spent time with (Puppet & Chef). Ansible is extremely simple to use and understand, so I thought it was time to write up some of my notes to help anyone getting to grips with using it on the Rackspace Public Cloud.

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Backing up a Eucalyptus Cloud Controller

When you first start using Eucalyptus, you are concerned with the intricacies of building images, configuring virtual instances and using all the variety of API features and tools that Eucalyptus offers.

However, when Eucalyptus becomes a tool your business relies on you need to consider making sure you can recover the system from a catastrophic failure. In the enterprise this usually means making adequate backups and being able to restore the whole system from those backups using an automated procedure perhaps with tools such as Ansible, Puppet and Chef or via a documented manual restore procedure. more ...


A Keepalived VIP for Eucalyptus Node Controllers

In a Eucalyptus HA configuration there are two Cluster Controllers's (CC) which are in an active-passive state. One is in "ENABLED" mode and one is "DISABLED" mode. If a failure occurs, the active CC services moves to the secondary CC system.

If you combine this with Eucalyptus MANAGED or MANAGED-NOVLAN networking configuration with a private back-end network your Node Controllers (NC) will require a default gateway for access to external networks and to the Walrus service to download Eucalyptus Machine Images.

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