Install the Ansible plug-ins - Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform 2.7

Create the registry authentication secret

Red Hat Developer Hub pulls the Ansible plug-ins directly from registry.redhat.io as OCI artifacts during startup. This requires a registry authentication secret in the same OpenShift Container Platform project as your Red Hat Developer Hub deployment.

Procedure

Log in to the container image registry:
```
$ podman login --authfile auth.json registry.redhat.io
```
To authenticate to multiple registries, run podman login for each registry. The auth.json file accumulates credentials for all registries you log in to.

Create a secret from the auth.json file in the same OpenShift Container Platform project as your Red Hat Developer Hub deployment.

For an Operator-based deployment:

$ oc create secret generic dynamic-plugins-registry-auth \
  --from-file=auth.json=auth.json \
  -n <your_rhdh_namespace>

For a Helm-based deployment:

$ oc create secret generic <release_name>-dynamic-plugins-registry-auth \
  --from-file=auth.json=auth.json \
  -n <your_rhdh_namespace>

Replace <release_name> with your Helm release name.

Important:

The secret name is fixed. The Red Hat Developer Hub Operator and Helm chart expect these exact names. You cannot use a custom name.

Table 1. Secret names by deployment method
Deployment method	Secret name
Operator	`dynamic-plugins-registry-auth`
Helm chart	`<release_name>-dynamic-plugins-registry-auth`

Note:

For disconnected or restricted network environments, mirror the automation-portal OCI image to an internal registry and use OCI references pointing to that registry instead.

Results

Verify that the secret exists in the project.

For an Operator-based deployment:

$ oc get secret dynamic-plugins-registry-auth -n <your_rhdh_namespace>

For a Helm-based deployment:

$ oc get secret <release_name>-dynamic-plugins-registry-auth -n <your_rhdh_namespace>

Configure the dynamic plug-ins

After creating the registry authentication secret, add the Ansible plug-ins to your dynamic plug-ins configuration.

Procedure

Edit your dynamic plug-ins configuration and add the Ansible plug-ins using OCI references.

Operator installation

In the data.dynamic-plugins.yaml.plugins block, add the Ansible plug-ins:

kind: ConfigMap
apiVersion: v1
metadata:
  name: dynamic-plugins-rhdh
data:
  dynamic-plugins.yaml: |
    includes:
      - dynamic-plugins.default.yaml
    plugins:
      - disabled: false
        package: >-
          oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-plugin-backstage-rhaap
        pluginConfig:
          dynamicPlugins:
            frontend:
              ansible.plugin-backstage-rhaap:
                appIcons:
                  - importName: AnsibleLogo
                    name: AnsibleLogo
                dynamicRoutes:
                  - importName: AnsiblePage
                    menuItem:
                      icon: AnsibleLogo
                      text: Ansible
                    path: /ansible
      - disabled: false
        package: >-
          oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-plugin-backstage-self-service
        pluginConfig:
          dynamicPlugins:
            frontend:
              ansible.plugin-backstage-self-service:
                scaffolderFieldExtensions:
                  - importName: AAPTokenFieldExtension
                  - importName: AAPResourcePickerExtension
      - disabled: false
        package: >-
          oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-backstage-plugin-catalog-backend-module-rhaap
        pluginConfig: {}
      - disabled: false
        package: >-
          oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-plugin-scaffolder-backend-module-backstage-rhaap
        pluginConfig:
          dynamicPlugins:
            backend:
              ansible.plugin-scaffolder-backend-module-backstage-rhaap:

Helm chart installation

Update the Helm chart configuration under the plugins section:

global:
  # ...
  dynamic:
    # ...
    plugins:
      - disabled: false
        package: >-
          oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-plugin-backstage-rhaap
        pluginConfig:
          dynamicPlugins:
            frontend:
              ansible.plugin-backstage-rhaap:
                appIcons:
                  - importName: AnsibleLogo
                    name: AnsibleLogo
                dynamicRoutes:
                  - importName: AnsiblePage
                    menuItem:
                      icon: AnsibleLogo
                      text: Ansible
                    path: /ansible
      - disabled: false
        package: >-
          oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-plugin-backstage-self-service
        pluginConfig:
          dynamicPlugins:
            frontend:
              ansible.plugin-backstage-self-service:
                scaffolderFieldExtensions:
                  - importName: AAPTokenFieldExtension
                  - importName: AAPResourcePickerExtension
      - disabled: false
        package: >-
          oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-backstage-plugin-catalog-backend-module-rhaap
        pluginConfig: {}
      - disabled: false
        package: >-
          oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-plugin-scaffolder-backend-module-backstage-rhaap
        pluginConfig:
          dynamicPlugins:
            backend:
              ansible.plugin-scaffolder-backend-module-backstage-rhaap:

Replace <tag> with the Ansible plug-ins image tag for your release (for example, 2.2).
Apply the changes. For Operator deployments, click Save. For Helm deployments, click Upgrade.

Add the Ansible Developer Tools sidecar container

After the plug-ins load, add the Ansible Developer Tools container as a sidecar container to the Red Hat Developer Hub pod.

About this task

Note:

The ansible-dev-tools-rhel9 container image is hosted on registry.redhat.io and requires Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform subscription entitlements. If your OpenShift Container Platform cluster's global pull secret does not include AAP-entitled credentials, you must create an imagePullSecrets entry in the deployment patch. You can reuse the same auth.json credentials created for the dynamic plug-ins registry secret:

$ oc create secret docker-registry rhdh-registry-pull-secret \
    --from-file=.dockerconfigjson=auth.json \
    -n <your_rhdh_namespace>

Then add the imagePullSecrets field to the deployment patch as shown in the examples below.

Procedure

Add the Ansible Developer Tools sidecar container to your deployment configuration.

Operator installation

Modify the Backstage custom resource to add a containers block in the spec.deployment.patch.spec.template.spec block:

apiVersion: rhdh.redhat.com/v1alpha5
kind: Backstage
metadata:
  name: developer-hub
spec:
  deployment:
    patch:
      spec:
        template:
          spec:
            imagePullSecrets:
              - name: rhdh-registry-pull-secret
            containers:
              - command:
                  - adt
                  - server
                image: registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform-2.7/ansible-dev-tools-rhel9:latest
                imagePullPolicy: Always
                ports:
                  - containerPort: 8000
                    protocol: TCP

Helm chart installation

Update the extraContainers section in the Helm chart YAML:

upstream:
  backstage:
    # ...
    extraContainers:
      - command:
          - adt
          - server
        image: >-
          registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform-2.7/ansible-dev-tools-rhel9:latest
        imagePullPolicy: IfNotPresent
        name: ansible-devtools-server
        ports:
          - containerPort: 8000
    # ...

Note:

The image pull policy is imagePullPolicy: IfNotPresent. The image is pulled only if it does not already exist on the node. Update it to imagePullPolicy: Always if you always want to use the latest image.

Apply the changes. For Operator deployments, click Save. For Helm deployments, click Upgrade.

Verify the plug-in installation

After configuring the dynamic plug-ins and sidecar container, verify that the Ansible plug-ins installed successfully.

Procedure

In the install-dynamic-plugin container logs, search for the Ansible plug-ins.

A successful installation shows:

==> Successfully installed dynamic plugin oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-plugin-backstage-rhaap
==> Successfully installed dynamic plugin oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-plugin-backstage-self-service
==> Successfully installed dynamic plugin oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-backstage-plugin-catalog-backend-module-rhaap
==> Successfully installed dynamic plugin oci://registry.redhat.io/ansible-automation-platform/automation-portal:<tag>!ansible-plugin-scaffolder-backend-module-backstage-rhaap

Verify that the Ansible plug-in is present in the navigation pane.
Select Administration to view the installed plug-ins in the Plugins tab.