Configuration management tools like Ansible, Chef, Puppet, and Saltstack allows us to configure a cluster of blank machines to help install and deploy an application. For example, with Ansible, we can set up a cluster of newly provisioned compute servers to e.g. install a specific version of Go, edit O.S. properties, or modify the firewall.
Are these tools still needed in today's world where we have cloud providers that offer managed k8s, docker registries, and machine images for us? For example, on AWS:
- We can configure an OS environment manually once and save it as an AMI, then simply just use this AMI for the cluster. Alternatively, we can just use Fargate.
- The Docker image will contain all needed dependencies, and will also have an entrypoint to run the application itself.
- Managed k8s like EKS mean we don't have to worry about setting up the control plane, and updating the cluster is as simple as issuing a kubectl command to the control plane.
Assuming one uses EKS + ECR + something like Terraform to provision the resources, what value would Ansible, Chef, etc. provide? Why would we want to include them into our stack? Or does modern cloud services make them unneccesary?
My question is inspired from this guide, which recommends using EKS + Terraform + Ansible... but the Ansible playbook is just 2 kubectl commands that can just be replaced by a shellscript, right? Why introduce an entirely new technology in our stack?
When should we use CMT along with EKS?
<= when you feel like you need them and they have an added value in your workflow. If you have the impression they are not useful in your specific case, just don't. There is actually no way to clearly answer this question with facts as you will probably get one different answer per person giving an answer.