Management Change and Problem Resolution

Change management

Network automation can help simplify the change management process, as it is a natural part of a pull request. The master branch can be locked, while only approved changes are allowed to be merged through a pull request. An approver has all the necessary artifacts to approve, deny, or conditionally reject a pull request asking the developer for more details. Documentation is automatically generated, and the changes to either the data model or dynamic template of a device are obvious and highlighted in TFS for the approver’s benefit.

Here is a sample workflow for this process:

1. There is a new requirement, change, feature, or correction required.
2. Work is assigned
3. A new working branch is created.
4. Engineer performs git pull, downloading the updates to the central repository.
5. Engineer changes to a new branch (git checkout).
6. Development work is done:
   • Adding/changing/deleting code
   • Testing—check mode
   • Generating documentation
7. Engineer performs commits often, ideally for small related changes
8. Engineer performs a git push uploading the changes to the central repository
9. Engineer submits a pull request
10. Pull request triggers an approval workflow
11. Approvers/reviewers notified
12. Pull request approved or denied
13. Merge approved request into the master branch
14. Automated build triggered
15. Documentation updated
16. Automated test triggered
17. Automated release schedules
18. Changed delivered to the environment through Ansible.

Alternatively, operators manually execute the approved Ansible playbooks if full CI/CD automation is not yet established.

Problem resolution

The ability to identify, troubleshoot, and resolve network problems get easier with the addition of these new tools. While CLI skills are still required, automation augments and extends the network team’s skills. This helps provide results at scale in near real-time. The source of truth can be referenced using pull requests and commit information to find the lastest changes, and how they relate to outages. The automated documentation can be used to confirm configurations and key information about devices without the need to connect to any device. Ansible can also be used to rapidly deploy a fix to the enterprise if a flaw is found or a change to multiple devices is required to resolve an issue. This method has the benefit of being included in the source of truth and master branch for future reference.