Ansible Architecture

push approach
two types of servers: controlling machines and nodes
there is a single controlling machine which is where orchestration begins
nodes are managed by a controlling machine over SSH
controlling machine describes the location of nodes through its inventory
to orchestrate nodes, Ansible deploys modules to nodes over SSH
Modules are temporarily stored in the nodes and communicate with the controlling machine through a JSON protocol over the standard output
when Ansible is not managing nodes, it does not consume resources because no daemons or programs are executing for Ansible in the background
Ansible uses an agentless architecture, unlike Chef, Puppet, and CFEngine
With an agent-based architecture, nodes must have a locally installed daemon that communicates with a controlling machine
agentless type of architecture reduces the overhead