# New to Ansible - how to setup a practice environment

**URL:** <https://forum.ansible.com/t/new-to-ansible-how-to-setup-a-practice-environment/19790>\
**Category:** Ansible Project\
**Tags:** windows\
**Created:** [November 18, 2015, 10:51am UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/new-to-ansible-how-to-setup-a-practice-environment/19790 "2015-11-18T10:51:50Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Paul\_Davies](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e79b87/32.png) [@Paul\_Davies](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Paul_Davies)\
**Post date:** [November 18, 2015, 10:51am UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/new-to-ansible-how-to-setup-a-practice-environment/19790/1 "2015-11-18T10:51:50Z")

</div>

Hi all

I am new to Linux, Ansible and CI/Devops in general having come from a Windows/SQL background

I am trying to learn Ansible, My requirements are to control it from a CentOS machine and control other CentOS/Solaris machines and possibly Win2008R2 too

on my Windows desktop, I have created a CentOS VirtualBox and installed Ansible via yum. I have no other remote machines to use as yet

My question is simply - how do you practice? Am I best creating other VirtualBox machines on the same host and trying to control those, or am I best creating other VMs on my CentOS VM and controlling those? If the latter - then am I best using VirtualBox again or Vagrant (new to that too) to create the target VMs?

Or am I best doing something completely different?

Any advise welcome!

thanks  
Paul

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Adria](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/838e76/32.png) [@Adria](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Adria)\
**Post date:** [November 18, 2015, 5:21pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/new-to-ansible-how-to-setup-a-practice-environment/19790/2 "2015-11-18T17:21:51Z")

</div>

[...]

> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;My question is simply - how do you practice? Am I best creating other  
> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;VirtualBox machines on the same host and trying to control those, or am I  
> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;best creating other VMs on my CentOS VM and controlling those? If the  
> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;latter - then am I best using VirtualBox again or Vagrant (new to that  
> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;too) to create the target VMs?  
> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Or am I best doing something completely different?  
> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Any advise welcome!  
> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;thanks  
> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Paul

Hi Paul,

my suggestion is that you practice in a test environment such as a  
VirtualBox VM as you told. Otherwise, using Vagrant is a good choice  
as well (see [1]).

You may have a look to Ansible Examples [0] and let the magic happens,  
and then try to adapt those examples to your needs.

Internet is plenty of Ansible manuals, so you could start with a basic  
"ansible -m ping localhost" style manual [1] and then become a ninja  
like OpenShift guys [2].

Hope it helps!

[0] [https://github.com/ansible/ansible-examples](https://github.com/ansible/ansible-examples)  
[1]  
[https://adamcod.es/2014/09/23/vagrant-ansible-quickstart-tutorial.html](https://adamcod.es/2014/09/23/vagrant-ansible-quickstart-tutorial.html)  
[2] [https://github.com/openshift/openshift-ansible](https://github.com/openshift/openshift-ansible)