🚀 High Availability Infrastructure Project – DevOps Practice

This repository is a hands-on DevOps and Linux Administration practice project, focused on building a High Availability (HA) infrastructure on cloud platforms.
It uses Terraform for infrastructure provisioning, Ansible for configuration management, HAProxy + Keepalived for redundancy, and ELK Stack for observability.

The project is structured into milestones that reflect real-world DevOps workflows and practices.

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🏗️ Architecture Overview

• Cloud VPC/VNet with public/private subnets
• 4 VM Instances:
  • load_balance_01, load_balance_02 → HAProxy + Keepalived (VIP failover)
  • web_server_01, web_server_02 → Nginx web servers with data sync
• Terraform → Infrastructure as Code (IaC)
• Ansible → Automated configuration and deployment
• ELK Stack → Centralized logging and observability
• Optional → Docker Swarm for container orchestration

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📖 Project Roadmap

This project is broken into 5 milestones, each simulating real-world DevOps practices:

Milestone 0: Foundations

• Goal: Prepare the environment by setting up cloud networking, provisioning base VM instances, configuring SSH access, and enabling Ansible automation.
• Issues:
  • Issue 0.1: Configure Terraform Provider & Variables
  • Issue 0.2: Create VPC/VNet, Subnets, Route Table, and Security Groups
  • Issue 0.3: Provision 4 VM Instances with Static Private IPs
  • Issue 0.4: Configure Ansible Inventory and Test Connectivity

Milestone 1: Core HA Architecture

• Goal: Deploy and configure HAProxy on two redundant load balancers with Keepalived to provide a Virtual IP (VIP) and ensure high availability of backend web servers.
• Issues:
  • Issue 1.1: Deploy HAProxy on Load Balancers
  • Issue 1.2: Configure HAProxy Frontend and Backend Pools
  • Issue 1.3: Enable HAProxy Stats Page for Monitoring
  • Issue 1.4: Install and Configure Keepalived for VIP
  • Issue 1.5: Test VIP Failover Between Load Balancers

Milestone 2: Backend & Data Sync

• Goal: Deploy backend web servers, configure them with Nginx, and ensure data consistency across nodes using file synchronization (rsync or DRBD).
• Issues:
  • Issue 2.1: Deploy Nginx on Web Servers
  • Issue 2.2: Configure HAProxy to Balance Web Servers
  • Issue 2.3: Implement File Synchronization Between Web Servers
  • Issue 2.4: Test Data Consistency and Failover

Milestone 3: Observability & Logging

• Goal: Deploy a centralized logging and monitoring stack using ELK (Elasticsearch, Logstash, Kibana) and configure log forwarding from all servers.
• Issues:
  • Issue 3.1: Deploy ELK Stack with Docker
  • Issue 3.2: Configure Log Forwarding with Filebeat
  • Issue 3.3: Validate Logs in Kibana and Build a Dashboard

Milestone 4: Container Orchestration (Optional Advanced)

• Goal: Introduce container orchestration using Docker Swarm to simulate distributed app deployment.
• Issues:
  • Issue 4.1: Initialize Docker Swarm Cluster
  • Issue 4.2: Deploy a Sample Web App as Docker Service
  • Issue 4.3: Configure Health Checks and Validate Service Recovery

Milestone 5: Disaster Recovery & Cleanup

• Goal: Simulate node failures, validate VIP and data recovery, and ensure proper cleanup of resources.
• Issues:
  • Issue 5.1: Simulate Load Balancer Failure and Validate VIP Failover
  • Issue 5.2: Test Web Server Data Recovery
  • Issue 5.3: Implement Terraform Destroy and Infrastructure CleanUp
  • Issue 5.4: Write Final Documentation and Lessons Learned

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⚡ Quick Start

1. Clone the Repo

git clone https://github.com/AhmadMWaddah/linux-high-availability-Prjct_03.git
cd linux-high-availability-Prjct_03/

2. Initialize Terraform

cd terraform
terraform init
terraform apply

3. Configure Ansible Inventory

[load_balancers]
load_balance_01 ansible_host=10.0.1.21
load_balance_02 ansible_host=10.0.1.22

[web_servers]
web_server_01 ansible_host=10.0.2.11
web_server_02 ansible_host=10.0.2.12

[all:vars]
ansible_user=ec2-user
ansible_ssh_private_key_file=~/.ssh/ha-cloud.pem

4. Run Ansible Playbook

ansible all -m ping -i inventories/hosts.ini

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📊 Project Status

• Milestone 0: Foundations – In Progress ✓
• Milestone 1: Core HA Architecture – Pending ✓
• Milestone 2: Backend & Data Sync – Pending ✓
• Milestone 3: Observability & Logging – Pending ✓
• Milestone 4: Container Orchestration – Pending ✓
• Milestone 5: Disaster Recovery & Cleanup – Pending ✓

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🧩 Tools Used

• Terraform – Infrastructure as Code
• Ansible – Configuration Management
• HAProxy + Keepalived – High Availability
• Nginx – Web Servers
• ELK Stack – Observability & Logging
• Docker Swarm (Optional) – Container Orchestration
• GitHub Projects & Issues – Task management
• Rsync – File synchronization

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📘 Lessons Learned

• High Availability is both redundancy and observability. Systems need to be designed with failure in mind from the start.
• Automating with Terraform + Ansible ensures consistency and reduces human error during deployments.
• Testing failover is as important as building HA. Regular testing confirms that redundancy mechanisms work as expected.
• Documentation makes practice projects portfolio-ready and helps with operational knowledge transfer.
• Infrastructure as Code enables reproducible environments that can be easily recreated.
• Centralized logging and monitoring are critical for understanding system behavior and troubleshooting issues.
• Network security and access controls must be considered early in the design process.

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🤝 Contributing

This project is primarily a practice lab. Feel free to fork it, suggest improvements, or extend milestones.

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📜 License

MIT License – free to use and modify for learning purposes.