What is Cloud Automation?

Cloud automation is not a rocket science technology. Expert cloud architects create a plan, how to move the existing infrastructure into the cloud environment. Before starting any project, a good cloud architect creates task lists. Task list makes the deployment and migration easy. It always gives confidence and signs that the project will be completed successfully. Either global organizations or start-ups, all are running into the cloud migration race. Many organizations have already moved to the cloud and in fact many more are strongly considering a shift in cloud technology.

In cloud migration, the task list is very long and needs to take care of all the initial setup. It’s difficult to remember and follow all the steps every time. Also, the manual creation of a task list required lots of effort and time. To reduce all these challenges, there are lots of cloud automation tools available in the market. Few automation tools are open source and can be used without any charges and a few tools need to pay to buy the license.

List of Top Cloud Automation Tools

Below are the top ten cloud automation tools which are most popular:

• Azure Resource Manager (ARM)
• Ansible
• Chef Automate
• CloudFormation
• Google Cloud Deployment Manager
• Kubernetes
• Packer
• Puppet 
• Scalr
• Terraform

1. Azure Resource Manager

It is also known as ARM. It is a tool to automate Azure cloud infrastructure. ARM is used to manage access management, security policy, and organize all the resources post-migration. A declarative template is used to manage the resource instead of the script. It’s easy to set the dependencies between resources so that the deployment task will be executed in the correct order.

2. Ansible

Ansible is a very popular cloud automation tool. Deployment of applications in the cloud using an ansible tool is very simple and easy. Simple English language is used in Unix shell script to automate the process. It doesn’t require an agent to install on a client system. YAML-based Playbooks are used to manage automation tasks. Ansible is written in Python language. Ansible Galaxy is a Source or repository from where instructions can be copied to an ansible-playbook.

3. Chef Automate

It is an open-source configuration management tool. Erlang and ruby are used to develop chef automation tools. Chef is used to managing the server and organizing configuration tasks. It is compatible with any cloud technology and reduces deployment risks, improving proficiency. The key terms used in Chef are Cookbook, Recipe. The recipe is used to manage the infrastructure. A collection of recipes is known as a cookbook.

4. CloudFormation

CloudFormation is a tool to automate amazon services in the cloud environment. It creates a template that explains all the amazon web services infrastructure which is required to migrate the services into the Amazon cloud. It’s not required to set the configuration manually for individual resources. CloudFormation tool takes care of all dependent activity for related deployment in amazon cloud migration. It’s easy to control and configure deployment.

5. Google Cloud Deployment Manager

It is a cloud automation tool or service which helps to deploy services in the Google cloud platform. It also allows creating templates and configurations. Google cloud manager provides the facility to use python or jinja to define the services as desired by customers. Configurations, templates, resources, and types are the fundamentals of google cloud deployment manager. 

6. Kubernetes

Kubernetes is a cloud automation tool that is used to manage services and containerized workloads. Kubernetes is an open-source portable tool, which can be compatible with all cloud platforms in any environment. Services and applications can be run in multiple clusters at the same time on a cloud platform.

7. Packer

Packer is DevOps open-source cloud automation tool that builds images from a single Jason configuration file. It keeps track of all the changes in the form of images. Packer is compatible with any cloud platform and can build multiple images in parallel.

8. Puppet

Puppet is a cloud automation software config management tool. Mainly it’s used in windows and Linux platforms to pull the strings on several servers parallelly. Administration of automation tools is the main feature of this puppet.

9. Scalr

Scalr is a web-based hybrid cloud automation tool. It is useful in large enterprises to manage private and public cloud platforms. Scalr maintains security policies, compliances at a low cost. The tool allows managing multiple cloud platforms in a single interface. One of the best features of the scalar automation tool is, it keeps track of services and prepares customized financial reports with auto alerts to avoid surpassing cost.

10. Terraform

Terraform is a cloud automation tool that follows the Infrastructure as Code (IaC) model. Terraform permits design, config, and version efficiently and safely. It allows modifying low-level components like compute services, networking, and storage solutions. It also manages high-level components like software as a services feature, Domain name entries efficiently and safely.