Ansible Automation for Tableau Server 2018.2+ running on Windows Server

Note: This is an example project and is not production-ready or supported

This project is intended to be an example of how to automate the installation and upgrade of a multi-node, cloud-based software deployment running on Windows Server. The subject of the example is Tableau Server. The following concepts are shown:

• Provisioning on AWS
• Orchestration
• Command Execution
• Configuration Management
• Patching

All of the playbooks are easy to run. To run in your specific AWS account you'll need to modify the variables in inventory.example/group_vars/all/aws.yml. The variables needed in this file can also be placed in the same file as the extra_vars detailed below.

Provision two EC2 instances on AWS for installing Tableau Server.

• aws_provisioning_password
  • Password used when provisioning the Windows VMs on AWS
  • Either provide this through an Ansible Vault encrypted file or with an Ansible Tower credential

ansible-playbook tableau-cluster-provision.yml -i inventory.example -e @secrets.yml

Orchestrate installation of Tableau Server on the two EC2 instances.

• aws_provisioning_password
  • Password used when provisioning the Windows VMs on AWS
  • Either provide this through an Ansible Vault encrypted file or with an Ansible Tower credential
• tableau_local_admin_user
  • Name of the local Windows user to create for Tableau administration purposes
• tableau_local_admin_pass
  • Password of the local Windows user to create for Tableau administration purposes
• tableau_content_admin_user
  • Name of the initial Tableau admin user
• tableau_content_admin_pass
  • Password of the initial Tableau admin user
• tableau_product_keys
  • A list of one or more product keys to enable on the Tableau nodes

ansible-playbook tableau-cluster-setup.yml -i inventory.example -e @secrets.yml

Orchestrate the upgrade of Tableau Server on the two EC2 instances.

Note: This does not actually perform an upgrade at this time since a Tableau Server trial key does not allow it. it is just an example of the orchestration needed to do the upgrade.

• aws_provisioning_password
  • Password used when provisioning the Windows VMs on AWS
  • Either provide this through an Ansible Vault encrypted file or with an Ansible Tower credential
• tableau_local_admin_user
  • Name of the local Windows user to create for Tableau administration purposes
• tableau_local_admin_pass
  • Password of the local Windows user to create for Tableau administration purposes
• tableau_content_admin_user
  • Name of the initial Tableau admin user
• tableau_content_admin_pass
  • Password of the initial Tableau admin user
• tableau_product_keys
  • A list of one or more product keys to enable on the Tableau nodes

ansible-playbook tableau-cluster-upgrade.yml -i inventory.example -e @secrets.yml

ansible-playbook tableau-uninstall.yml -i inventory.example -e @secrets.yml

ansible-playbook windows-update.yml -i inventory.example -e @secrets.yml