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AWX

Role in the Platform

AWX provides a UI, API, scheduler, inventory integration, and execution environment for approved Ansible automation. The legacy documentation describes an established WxCCE deployment and automation-generated metrics forwarded through Telegraf. Confirm current WxCDI ownership and deployment status before treating AWX as a WxCDI production dependency.

Automation Flow

graph LR
    Git["Ansible Project"] --> AWX["AWX Job Template"]
    Inventory["Managed Inventory"] --> AWX
    Keeper["Managed Credentials"] --> AWX
    Art["Execution Environment / Bundle"] --> AWX
    AWX --> Devices["Approved Device Targets"]
    AWX --> Telegraf["Automation Metrics"]
    Telegraf --> Mimir["Mimir"]

Job Requirements

Every production job template should identify:

  • project repository and pinned revision/branch;
  • managed inventory source and target limit;
  • execution environment version;
  • credential object without embedded secret values;
  • survey/default variables and which can be overridden;
  • timeout, concurrency, and failure behavior;
  • owner, runbook, and expected output/artifacts.

Safe Operation

  1. Sync the project and inventory, then review the diff in targets.
  2. Run syntax/check mode where the playbook supports it.
  3. Limit the first execution to a non-customer or approved canary target.
  4. Review changed/failed/unreachable counts and task output.
  5. Expand scope only after canary validation.
  6. Confirm automation-generated metrics or artifacts reached their destination.

Never pass passwords or tokens through extra variables unless the field is credential-backed and protected. Do not use broad inventory groups when a precise limit is available.

Troubleshooting

Symptom Check
Project sync fails Repository credential, branch, and network path
Inventory is stale Inventory source sync result and generated inventory revision
Job is pending Instance-group capacity and execution-environment pull
Hosts unreachable Credential, DNS, network path, and target limit
Job succeeds but metrics are absent Telegraf listener, payload format, labels, and Mimir output
Behavior changed after update Execution environment and collection dependency versions

References