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Add to SafariWhen comparing Chef vs Ansible, the Slant community recommends Ansible for most people. In the question“What are the best configuration management tools?” Ansible is ranked 2nd while Chef is ranked 5th. The most important reason people chose Ansible is:
Ansible does not use agents. Instead, all master-agent communications are handled via SSH commands or through the Paramiko module which provides a Python interface to SSH.
Specs
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Large community
Chef has a relatively large community. One of the reasons for it is the fact that it's a pretty old and mature tool. Chef, originally released in 2009, is a more mature product. Being popular and with a large and dedicated community means that Chef has lots and lots of resources and guides from third party sources out there for beginners to pick up. Not only that, there are also many plugins and configuration recipes made by the community.
Pro Cross-platform
Chef is cross-platform. Offering support for the biggest platforms out there: Linux, Windows and *nix.
Pro Popular choice among large companies
Chef has an impressive list of companies using it's automation service. Among them is Facebook, Etsy, Ancestry.com, PharmMD and Yahoo.
Pro Strong version control capabilities
Chef is centered around Git for it's configuration and deployments. Because of this, Chef also has great version control capabilities through Git.
Pro Mature
Chef was released in 2009, which is relatively a long time ago for software. Since then it has been through several versions and many bug fixes and tests. All of this can make Chef more appealing to teams who are looking for stability and maturity, which are things that Chef brings on the table.
Pro Agentless
Ansible does not use agents. Instead, all master-agent communications are handled via SSH commands or through the Paramiko module which provides a Python interface to SSH.
Pro Gentle learning curve
Ansible is agentless, making it quick and painless to setup. Ansible has clear and detailed documentation and provides plenty of built-in modules. Its DSL is obtained using YAML and a familiar template system.
Pro Simple tasks can be run from the command line
Some simple tasks such as triggering updates or reboots, or even checking if the service is running can be done without configuration files. These commands can be run from the command line instead.
Pro Support for major cloud providers
Ansible supports managing major cloud devices (AWS, RackSpace, Digital Ocean, OpenStack) through a collection of modules which are available.
Pro Extensible in any language / runtime
Although you may need to preinstall favorite programming environment, Ansible modules are accessed via shell calls and therefore any executable on the remote system built for use with Ansible may be used as an Ansible module.
Pro Web UI
Ansible has a Web UI in the form of AnsibleWorks AWX which unfortunately does not tie directly into the CLI. So configuration elements present in the CLI can not appear in the UI unless a sync pass is run. Although the Web UI is helpful and functional, it's still not as complete feature-wise as the CLI.
Pro Easy to customize
Ansible is very easy to customize. It doesn't force you to use a language with which you are unfamiliar. Instead, all commands are packaged into YAML modules which are called playbooks. So as long as you use a programming language that can output JSON, you are able to customize it.
Pro Rich diff
Modules that support rich diffs can expose nearly every detail of what will change. However not all core modules support diffs, so there may still be some opaque chances made.
Pro Creating reusable components is simple
Making roles modular and reusable is a fast process with Ansible.
Cons
Con Ties you to Ruby
Chef is written in Ruby and its CLI uses a Ruby-based DSL. In order to fully use and customize it you need to use Ruby as Chef does not give users any other choice when it comes to languages to use to configure it.
Con Steep learning curve
Chef has a steeper learning curve than many of its competitors, making it a more difficult tool for the non-devs of a team (such as sysadmins) to work with. For some teams, the added cost of teaching Chef to the team may outweigh the benefits.
Con Slow
Compared to other tools, Ansible requires more time to complete the same actions.
Con Somewhat weak documentation
Ansible is still relatively new, as far as server automation tools go. This is the reason that many users have found it's documentation lacking in some parts. Although this is mitigated by the fact that it's very easy to learn to use.
Con Too easy to move the port in the crappy scripts you've been using for years
If you have an extensive codebase of scripts, your users might find it too easy to just port in the same unsupportable crappy scripts they've been using for years.
Con Doesn't have its own inventory system
Ansible really depends on you to provide it a list of nodes to run on and doesn't actively maintain a central inventory
Con No Python API available, despite the fact that Ansible is written in Python
Despite being written and taking good advantage of the python environment, Ansible offers no python api for programming, and does not make it possible to follow best practices for writing custom Ansible modules.
