Labbuild 2.0

A complete rebuild of the lab provisioning and management system for Red Education, achieving dramatic performance improvements.

Overview

Labbuild 2.0 is a lab infrastructure automation platform that provisions, configures, and manages cloud-based training environments for Red Hat certification courses.

Key Achievements

• 90% Performance Improvement: Reduced lab provisioning time from 45 minutes to under 5 minutes
• Parallel Processing: Implemented async/await patterns for concurrent VM provisioning
• Smart Caching: MongoDB-based caching layer for template and configuration data
• RESTful APIs: FastAPI-powered APIs for integration with LMS platforms

Technical Stack

• Core Application: Python 3.11 with asyncio
• Web Framework: Flask for admin dashboard, FastAPI for REST APIs
• Database: MongoDB for flexible document storage
• Task Queue: Celery with Redis for background job processing
• Cloud Integration: Multi-cloud support (AWS, Azure, GCP)

Architecture Decisions

Why FastAPI for APIs?

We chose FastAPI for its automatic OpenAPI documentation, type hints support, and excellent async performance. The auto-generated Swagger docs significantly reduced integration time with partner systems.

MongoDB for Configuration

Training lab configurations are highly variable - each course has different VM requirements, network topologies, and software stacks. MongoDB's flexible schema perfectly suited this use case.