Michael Mikhailidi - Chronicles of Technology

Ansible: Selections

Let's discuss selections in Ansible: if-then-else and case/switch operators. Ansible offers conditional execution for single tasks, blocks, and task imports. In addition, it allows effectively simulate if-then selection.

Now on Telegram

The Ghost blog platform offers powerful integration capabilities. From the early days, we have enabled RSS feed, available practically out of the box. In addition, pre-configured integrations with modern automation

MySQL

Ghost Upgrade: A Bit of MySQL

This morning I accidentally brought down this site. The Ghost CLI told me that there is a minor upgrade to version 4.11.0. Unfortunately, even though the start version

Ansible

Ansible: Subroutines

The second post in the Ansible: Control Structures series describes using Ansible core components to emulate subroutines - procedures and "packages." The whole paradigm of Ansible is the opposite of

Ansible

Ansible: Control Structures

Red Hat Ansible is a powerful and easy-to-learn automation product. Simplicity is one of the basic principles of the language. Yet, any task a titbit more complex than installing and starting an HTTPD server requires good old procedural control flows.

Ansible

Ansible Variables: a Rookie Mistake

The mistake I made could be excused for Java Developer, but not for a guy who spends days with Ansible. The root cause is the different variable visibility model. Red Hat Ansible does not appreciate role or play boundaries and dynamically evaluates a variable value for each impacted host.

SSH

Unappreciated SSH Client Config

Some IT folks how are fluent with the server configuration of the SSH daemon. But I can hardly name a few who knows how helpful client SSH configuration is.

Git

Automate Housekeeping

For one who does automation for living, it's okay to be a bit lazy. So let's talk about how I keep my local git repositories in order with minimal effort.

Ansible

Ansible and Git Submodules

Let's discuss a problem I faced, moving from Ansible to the Ansible Tower. The problem is how to maintain multiple inventories scattered all over new projects effectively.

Ansible

Ansible: Conditional Playbooks

I have praised Ansible tags all about the previous post. Unfortunately, tags don't go along with Ansible Tower's complex workflows. Let me guide you through the playbook transformation we've done. The answer to this challenge is extra variables.

Ansible

Ansible: the Power of Tags

Let's talk about why you should use tags in your Ansible playbooks. For starters, I'll lecture you a bit about tags in the Ansible language, and then show you how we use them in a real-life scenario.

Ansible

Ansible Tower: Dynamic Usernames

The slow drift toward the Red Hat Ansible Tower uncovers more and more compatibility issues, so I have to go back and revisit some decisions and make sure that the same code would fit both worlds.

Ghost

Ghost 4: the Major Upgrade

This small how-to could be helpful if you have a standalone Ghost platform and plan to upgrade it to the latest version - Ghost 4.4.0.

Containers

Maven Project with Docker Compose

This little tweak streamlines the development lifecycle and simplifies build and test operations. If you build something with Docker and Apache Maven you could find this article useful.

Ansible

Ansible: Consume SQL*Plus Output

A simple way to consume Oracle Database data in Ansible playbooks without extensive Python or PL/SQL coding or 3rd party modules.

Ansible

Ansible: dynamic usernames

Ansible uses OS username to authenticate against targets. When you need to run commands as a different user, you have multiple options: privilege escalation, set a remote username, and dynamic definition in inventory.

Keycloack

Keycloak: Use Oracle Autonomous database

The Keycloack Server documentation recommends an external database to persist realms configuration. The article describes how to configure Oracle Autonomous Transaction Processing service with WildFly/JBoss application server.

Keycloack

Keycloack: configure frontend URL

It's turned out that my free tier VMs are powerful enough to run a standalone Keycloack server. I'm not a big fan of the direct instance access on high ports,

Git

What I ignore in Ansible projects

Keep your repository neat and clean is a mandatory repository requirement, same as readable documentation and a good code, preferably useful. So, one of the first things I do in a new project is a .gitignore file.

Ansible

How to run Ansible playbooks à-la Tower

Our Red Hat Ansible projects drift to the Ansible Tower. I found that it much faster to do quick fixes and debug playbooks from the server rather than go through the full chain VSCode -> Git -> Tower. Well, to be productive, I automated the automation.

OpenSSL

Quick Certificate Validation

Check certificate validity for a site; what could be easier? It's a click away if the address of interest is in your browser. Learn how you can check expiration dates for multiple Learn how you can check expiration dates for multiple host or virtual hosts with SNI.

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure

Enforce HTTPS With OCI Load Balancer

To enforce secure connection you should enforce rewrite rules to rout your clients toward secure listener. The same could be done with load balancer in Oracle Cloud.

WebLogic

Speeding up WLST

Back in Java 7 days, when your WebLogic domain runs like a snail on a sunny meadow, you knew that you forgot to fix your random source. It is not

JDeveloper

Easy JDK update

Working on the integrated WebLogic server configuration, I run into a very neat Middleware 12c feature. The primary fix for the issue is to use old JDK8. When you have JDeveloper and domain configured, you can upgrade your installation to the desired JDK version, with simple steps below.

JDeveloper

DefaultDomain in SOA Studio 12.2.1.4

I always struggle to configure internal WebLogic 12.2.x server and domain. Finally, Oracle Support helped me to complete the SOA/BPM Studio 12.2.1.4 configuration.