🛠 Status: In Development

Catapult is currently in development. This package is still being developed and is not yet production ready. There are things that haven't been finalized yet, so this repo might change before it's ready for production. Check out the list of Known Issues and TODOs for updates.

Catapult

Download · Install · Examples · Todos ·

Catapult is an open source deployment tool and package format for ansible.
You can easily separate your depoyment logic and your release packages.

Why catapult?

According to wikipedia, catapult is a tool to delivery packages to remote places, thus it can be ideal tool for deployment.

Install

It's easy, just install capatult role under your roles folder.

ansible-galaxy install csakaszamok-catapult

Usage

Just call it from your ansible playbook

- include_role:
    name: csakaszamok.catapult

Parameters

Name	Type	Required	Default	Description
`autostart`	bool	not	false	If it is false you have to confirm to start manually
`release_folder`	string	yes		Current deployment folder path
`inventory_name`	string	yes		It's reletad to a host gorup name in the inventories folder

Basic concept

When you often have to manage a lot of release then probably you want to prepare these future deployments in diffrerent packages. With catapult you can easily separete your deployment logic and your deployment packages.

Catapult is just an ansible playbook that uses payloads for identifying deployment packages.
Each deployment package (name is playload) is a simple folder layout that contains a collection of ansible rules where every rules represent a host group in your inventory.
So if you know ansible then you already know catapult palyload format.

In summary:

catapult = an ansible playbook that uses csakaszamok-catpault role
payload, projectile = a folder with host gorup specified roles

Let's take a look for some examples.

Examples

Tip: You can find below examples under example folder

Preparing

First of all create some containers for playing

docker run -it -d -p 1121:22 rastasheep/ubuntu-sshd
docker run -it -d -p 1122:22 rastasheep/ubuntu-sshd
docker run -it -d -p 1123:22 rastasheep/ubuntu-sshd

Build up your own catapult powered playbook:

/home/your-playbook/site.yml:

---  
  - name: deploy
    hosts: all            
    gather_facts: false
    tasks:       
    - include_role:
        name: csakaszamok.catapult
      vars:
        - autostart: true        
      when: release_folder and inventory_name

/home/your-playbook/inventories/dev1/hosts:

[all:vars]
inventory_name=dev1

; --> ! payloads will use groupnames like this to identify foldernames under payloads !
[webserver] 
local1 ansible_host=127.0.0.1  ansible_user=root ansible_ssh_pass=root ansible_port=1121
local2 ansible_host=127.0.0.1  ansible_user=root ansible_ssh_pass=root ansible_port=1122

; --> ! payloads will use groupnames like this to identify foldernames under payloads !
[anotherservers] 
local3 ansible_host=127.0.0.1  ansible_user=root ansible_ssh_pass=root ansible_port=1123

and finally but not least don't forget to install catapult under roles folder:

ansible-galaxy install csakaszamok-catapult

Everything is ready, so now we can prepare some payloads for catapult.

Payload example 1: copy file to host(s)

Goal: we want to put a simple file to /home/document on target server

Create a payload folder layout

release_v0.0.1
|
---- webserver --> ! this folder name relates to inventory hostnames !
     |
     ---- files
          |
          ---- home
               |
               ---- documents
                    |
                    ---- text1.txt

Execute your script:

ansible-playbook -i inventories/dev1 site.yml --extra-vars "release_folder=payloads/release_v0.0.1"

Payload example 2: events, manage services

Create another payload folder

release_v0.0.2
|
---- webserver --> ! this folder name relates to inventory hostnames !
     |
     ---- handlers
     |     |
     |     ---- main.yml
     |          
     ---- taksk
          | 
          ---- main.yml

handlers' main.yml:

---
- name: "{{ role_name|basename }}_on_before_copy_files"
  service:
      name: nginx
      state: stopped

- name: "{{ role_name|basename }}_on_after_copy_files"
  service:
      name: nginx
      state: started

Becuase all of the handlers are in global scope, handlers' name have to follow a specific name convention: current role name + suffix:
{{ role_name|basename }}_on_after_copy_files

tasks' main.yml:

---
- name: ensure nginx is at the latest version
  apt: name=nginx state=latest
- name: basic start nginx
  service:
      name: nginx
      state: started