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There are 4 modules in this course
In this course, learners will unlock the potential of automation for computer fleet management. This course provides a solid foundation in automation techniques, offering a pathway to becoming a versatile IT professional prepared to launch and support modern cloud based applications and systems. This course covers the art of automating computer deployment and management in a cloud-based environment, including the configuration of virtual machines using Puppet and managing infrastructure resources through orchestration tools like Terraform and command-line interfaces (CLIs). Learners will also explore how to define Service-Level Objectives (SLOs) and implement monitoring and actionable alerting systems to swiftly address issues. They’ll also gain expertise in incident management and recovery, including rollbacks, redundancy, and creating disaster recovery plans.
In this module, you’ll be introduced to the concept of automation at scale and how it can be successfully achieved. You’ll learn what it means to work at scale and how automation is needed to scale effectively. Next, you’ll be introduced to configuration management. You’ll learn the differences between unmanaged and managed configuration management. Then, you’ll dive into infrastructure as code and learn about the benefits it brings, like making your fleet of nodes more reliable and repeatable. This is a major benefit when managing systems at scale. In the next lesson, you’ll be introduced to Puppet. You’ll learn how to apply basic configuration management and how Puppet agents and masters interact with each other. Next, you’ll do a rundown of Puppet resources and classes. You’ll learn how resources are basic units for modeling your configurations and how classes are a collection of resources used to achieve a single goal. The final lesson will introduce you to the building blocks of domain-specific language. You’ll learn what Puppet facts are and how it uses a program called Facter to analyze, store and gather this information. Your final lesson will cover the driving principles of configuration management. You’ll learn about declarative, procedural, and idempotent principals and how they differ from each other.
What's included
11 videos10 readings4 assignments1 app item
Show info about module content
11 videos•Total 45 minutes
Course Introduction•5 minutes
Automating with Configuration Management•2 minutes
What is scale?•3 minutes
What is configuration management?•6 minutes
What is infrastructure as code?•6 minutes
What is Puppet?•4 minutes
Puppet Resources•3 minutes
Puppet Classes•2 minutes
What are domain-specific languages?•5 minutes
The Driving Principles of Configuration Management•6 minutes
Module 1 Wrap Up: Automating with Configuration Management•3 minutes
10 readings•Total 86 minutes
Welcome to the course•4 minutes
Review: What is Puppet?•10 minutes
Review: Puppet Resources•10 minutes
Review: Puppet Classes•10 minutes
Puppet Resources•10 minutes
Review: What are domain specific languages?•10 minutes
Review: The driving principles of configuration management•10 minutes
More Information About Configuration Management•2 minutes
Qwiklabs guidelines and troubleshooting steps•10 minutes
Exemplar: Debug Puppet Installation•10 minutes
4 assignments•Total 80 minutes
Test your knowledge: Automation at scale•10 minutes
Test your knowledge: Introduction to Puppet•10 minutes
Test your knowledge: The building blocks of configuration management•10 minutes
In this module, you’ll dive into deploying Puppet on your local machine. Once you’ve completed that task, you’ll start creating and applying Puppet rules, managing resource relationships, and organizing your Puppet modules, which are a collection of manifests and associated data. Next, you’ll learn about Puppet nodes and node definitions and how they’re used to apply rules to your fleet. Then, you’ll dive into the Puppet certificate infrastructure, which explores the logic behind how the server can trust that a client is really who it claims to be. This topic will introduce the concepts of public key infrastructure and secure socket layer, which can ensure the clients can be trusted. Once you’ve understood these concepts, you’ll get to see a Puppet deployment in action! Your final lesson will center on updating, modifying, and testing manifests that you’ve deployed to your fleet. You’ll explore Puppet parser validate commands that will allow you to check the syntax to ensure it's correct. Next, you’ll explore the difference between production and testing environments, and how you can safely roll out changes to the testing environment to catch any errors. You’ll also learn about development environments and how you can siphon part of your fleet to an early-adopters or canary track to roll out changes, modification, or updates to that subset of machines.
What's included
10 videos10 readings4 assignments1 app item
Show info about module content
10 videos•Total 44 minutes
Intro to Module 2: Deploying Puppet•2 minutes
Applying Rules Locally•5 minutes
Managing Resource Relationships•5 minutes
Organizing Your Puppet Modules•6 minutes
Puppet Nodes•4 minutes
Puppet's Certificate Infrastructure•5 minutes
Setting up Puppet Clients and Servers•6 minutes
Modifying and Testing Manifests•4 minutes
Safely Rolling out Changes and Validating Them•5 minutes
More Information About Deploying Puppet Locally•2 minutes
Review: Puppet nodes•10 minutes
Review: Setting up Puppet clients and servers•10 minutes
More Information about Deploying Puppet to Clients•2 minutes
Review: Modifying and testing manifests•10 minutes
More Information About Updating Deployments•2 minutes
Exemplar: Finishing a Puppet deployment•10 minutes
4 assignments•Total 80 minutes
Test your knowledge: Deploying Puppet locally•10 minutes
Test your knowledge: Deploying Puppet to clients•10 minutes
Test your knowledge: Updating deployments•10 minutes
Module 2 challenge•50 minutes
1 app item•Total 90 minutes
Qwiklabs Assessment: Finishing a Puppet deployment•90 minutes
Automation in the Cloud
Module 3•4 hours to complete
Module details
In this module, you’ll learn about cloud services and the different types of cloud services, like SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS. Next, you’ll learn about scaling in the cloud and how to modify the capacity of your service. You’ll learn about horizontal and vertical scaling, which then ties into automatic versus manual scaling. Next, you’ll explore how much control you have over your system, depending on whether you choose SaaS, Paas, or IaaS, and assess which one is right for your business. You’ll rundown the options available to migrate your business to the cloud using strategies like lift and shift.
In the next lesson, you’ll learn how to manage instances in the cloud by creating one! You’ll explore the different options available, like regions, machine types, and lots more. Then, you’ll look into customizing and templating virtual machines to enable you to deploy them at scale. Our final lesson will explore the concept of automating cloud deployments. You’ll learn about load balancers, which ensure that each node receives a balanced number of requests, as well as autoscaling, which shuts nodes on and off, as needed. Next, you’ll learn about orchestration and how orchestration and automation differ. Last up, you’ll learn about infrastructure as code (IaC), or machine readable configuration files that automate configuration management.
What's included
13 videos4 readings4 assignments1 app item
Show info about module content
13 videos•Total 66 minutes
Intro to Module 3: Automation in the Cloud•2 minutes
Cloud Services Overview•6 minutes
Scaling in the Cloud•7 minutes
Evaluating the Cloud•5 minutes
Migrating to the Cloud•6 minutes
Spinning up VMs in the Cloud•5 minutes
Creating a New VM Using the GCP Web UI•6 minutes
Customizing VMs in GCP•6 minutes
Templating a Customized VM•7 minutes
Cloud Scale Deployments•5 minutes
What is orchestration?•4 minutes
Cloud Infrastructure as Code•5 minutes
Module 3 Wrap Up: Automation in the Cloud•2 minutes
4 readings•Total 22 minutes
Review: Templating a customized VM•10 minutes
Managing VMs in GCP•2 minutes
More About Cloud & GCP•2 minutes
Exemplar: Create a VM template and automate deployment•8 minutes
4 assignments•Total 80 minutes
Test your knowledge: Cloud computing•10 minutes
Test your knowledge: Managing instances in the cloud•10 minutes
Test your knowledge: Automating cloud deployments•10 minutes
Module 3 challenge•50 minutes
1 app item•Total 90 minutes
Qwiklabs Assessment: Creating a VM template and Automating deployment•90 minutes
Managing Cloud Instances at Scale
Module 4•4 hours to complete
Module details
In this module, you’ll learn all about storing data in the cloud. You’ll rundown the different types of storage available, like block storage and object storage, and how they differ. You’ll explore load balancing further and dive into some load balancing techniques, like round-robin DNS and sticky sessions. Next, you’ll dive into change management, including the different ways to test your changes and how to push them. You’ll explore different testing methods, like unit tests and integration tests. You’ll also cover continuous integration, the use of continuous deployment, and how to apply A/B testing. Next up, you’ll look at some errors you might encounter along the way, like quotas or limits, and how best to avoid or prepare for these.
In the next lesson, you’ll get an understanding of monitoring and altering, and review some systems that offer it. You’ll then dive into the concept of SLA’s and how to set achievable ones. Next, you’ll look at basic monitoring in GCP, and create altering policies, set up conditions, and choose aggregators to manage the data. The last lesson will explore troubleshooting and debugging our systems. You’ll learn how to troubleshoot and debug remotely, understand. techniques for how to identify where the failure is coming from, and how to recover from a failure when it strikes.
What's included
14 videos5 readings4 assignments1 app item
Show info about module content
14 videos•Total 67 minutes
Intro to Module 4: Managing Cloud Instances at Scale•2 minutes
Storing Data in the Cloud•8 minutes
Load Balancing•6 minutes
Change Management•6 minutes
Understanding Limitations•5 minutes
Getting Started with Monitoring•5 minutes
Getting Alerts When Things Go Wrong•6 minutes
Service-Level Objectives•6 minutes
Basic Monitoring in GCP•9 minutes
What to Do When You Can't Be Physically There•3 minutes
Identifying Where the Failure Is Coming From•3 minutes
Recovering from Failure•4 minutes
Module 4 Wrap Up: Managing Cloud Instances at Scale•2 minutes
Congratulations!•1 minute
5 readings•Total 12 minutes
More About Cloud Providers•2 minutes
More Information on Monitoring and Alerting•2 minutes
Debugging Problems on the Cloud•2 minutes
Exemplar: Debugging a problem with a Cloud Deployment and Fix it•4 minutes
Course 5 glossary•2 minutes
4 assignments•Total 80 minutes
Practice Quiz: Building Software for the Cloud•10 minutes
Test your knowledge: Monitoring and alerting•10 minutes
Test your knowledge: Troubleshooting and debugging•10 minutes
Module 4 challenge•50 minutes
1 app item•Total 90 minutes
Qwiklabs Assessment: Debugging a problem with a Cloud Deployment and Fix it•90 minutes
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Learner reviews
4.7
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3 stars
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Showing 3 of 2652
L
LM
5·
Reviewed on Aug 10, 2020
Good introduction about Cloud and general overview of cloud. There is not much deep dive into Puppet as I expected. More examples into using Puppet would have made it even better.
M
MQ
5·
Reviewed on Oct 13, 2020
Configuration Management and the Cloud are not easy to understand and learning them has been, like all the courses I've taken on coursera before, a great experience.
V
VV
4·
Reviewed on Jun 14, 2020
The course material is apt and the practice sessions actually have the essence of real-time use cases. However, more practice tests are required to get a better and broader feel.
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