Automated Runbooks: The Key to Faster Incident Recovery

Ever felt buried under a mountain of alerts during an outage? Struggle to triage incidents while managing complex microservice environments? Automated runbooks can be your saving grace.

A runbook is a set of instructions that guides engineers through resolving system issues. Traditionally, these runbooks are manual. Automated runbooks, however, take things a step further. They can automate repetitive tasks, freeing up engineers to focus on more complex problems.

This blog explores the world of automated runbooks, explaining what they are and how they can benefit your team. We’ll also provide best practices for creating effective runbook templates and explore some popular runbook automation tools.

What is a Runbook?

A runbook is a collection of procedures used to address common system issues. They function as a roadmap, guiding engineers through the troubleshooting process from start to finish.

Here’s a breakdown of the different runbook types:

• Procedural Runbooks: These are manual runbooks where engineers follow documented steps using standard tools to access production systems.
• Executable Runbooks: Similar to procedural runbooks, executable runbooks allow engineers to run automation tasks (shell scripts, PowerShell scripts, etc.) on target systems to fix problems.
• Automated Runbooks: As the name suggests, automated runbooks execute tasks without manual intervention.

Why Use Automated Runbooks with Runbook Templates?

• Reduce Time Spent on Repetitive Tasks: Automated runbooks can handle the mundane, freeing up engineers to focus on more strategic work.
• Faster Incident Resolution: By automating tasks, you can significantly reduce the time it takes to resolve incidents.
• Improved Consistency: Automated runbooks ensure everyone follows the same steps, leading to more consistent outcomes.
• Reduced Human Error: Automation minimizes the risk of errors introduced by manual intervention.
• Easy Creation and Maintenance: Runbook templates provide a standardized format to streamline runbook creation and ensure consistency across your team.

Use Cases for Runbook Templates

Here are a few examples of how automated runbooks with templates can streamline operations:

• Active Directory: Automate user onboarding tasks such as creating user accounts and assigning group memberships using a pre-defined runbook template.
• Virtual Machine/Service Management: Restart VMs after patching, check service status, or restart services following deployments using a virtual machine management runbook template.
• Log Management: Automate log rotation or archiving to Azure log tables for analysis using a log management runbook template.
• Monitoring: Monitor system health, including host availability, disk space, daemon/service health, and resource utilization, with a pre-built monitoring runbook template.
• Configuration Management: Deploy standard configurations for services, clients, network equipment, and mobile devices. This ensures adherence to security policies and simplifies OS and application configuration using a configuration management runbook template.

Popular Runbook Automation Tools

Let’s explore some popular tools to automate your runbooks:

• Azure Automation: Microsoft’s cloud-based solution manages and configures workloads across Azure and non-Azure environments. It offers process automation, update management, and configuration features. Runbooks can be triggered by Azure Alerts, webhooks, schedules, Logic Apps, or other runbooks. You can leverage built-in runbook templates or create your own.
• Rundeck: This web-based console dispatches commands and scripts to nodes. Create jobs from existing scripts, run commands on select nodes, or schedule jobs for later execution. Rundeck simplifies automating routine and ad-hoc tasks and provides runbook templates to get you started.
• Ansible: A powerful open-source configuration management tool, Ansible uses “playbooks” (similar to runbook templates) to deploy, manage, and configure environments from single servers to multi-server setups. Playbooks define a set of procedures. Benefits of Ansible include its agentless architecture, Python support, secure SSH connections, and push-based architecture.
• Squadcast Runbooks: This next-generation Reliability Orchestration Engine integrates with Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) principles. It allows you to host and execute runbooks in response to operational events or incidents, eliminating repetitive tasks. Squadcast offers pre-built runbook templates to jumpstart your automation.

Best Practices for Creating Runbook Templates

Here are some key considerations when crafting effective runbook templates:

• Start with Common Issues: Identify frequently encountered problems and use them to build your core set of runbook templates.
• Modular Design: Create modular templates that can be combined for more complex scenarios.
• Clarity and Concision: Use clear and concise language throughout your runbook templates.
• Documentation: Include detailed documentation for each step, including screenshots or references if necessary.
• Version Control: Implement version control for your runbook templates to track changes and ensure you’re using the latest version.
• Testing: Thoroughly test your runbook templates before deployment.

How to Write a Runbook

While templates provide a starting point, you may need to customize them for specific situations. Here’s a general guideline for writing a runbook using a template:

1. Select an Appropriate Template: Choose a runbook template that aligns with the issue you’re addressing.
2. Customize the Template: Fill in the specific details and procedures required for your scenario.
3. Integrate Automation: Identify tasks that can be automated and integrate them into the runbook template.
4. Test and Deploy: Thoroughly test your customized runbook before deployment. Store it in an easily accessible location and review it periodically to ensure it’s up-to-date.

What Should a Runbook Template Include?

A well-crafted runbook template should include the following elements:

• Template Name: Clearly identify the issue or scenario addressed by the template.
• Description: Provide a brief overview of the template’s purpose.
• Preconditions: List any requirements that must be met before using the template.
• Steps: Outline the step-by-step process for resolving the issue, including: Detailed instructions for each step, Screenshots or references for complex steps
• Expected Outcome: Describe the desired outcome after following the steps.
• Troubleshooting Tips: Include troubleshooting steps for common problems.
• Version History: Track changes made to the template over time.

Conclusion

By incorporating automation and strategic process management with runbook templates, you can significantly improve your incident response capabilities. Automated runbooks ensure your documentation is up-to-date and readily available when needed, expediting incident resolution.

Squadcast, an incident management tool built for SRE principles, helps you eliminate unnecessary alerts, receive relevant notifications, integrate with popular ChatOps tools, collaborate using virtual incident war rooms, and leverage automation to minimize toil.

Ready to streamline your incident response and empower your SRE team? Consider implementing automated runbooks with Squadcast today!