HON’s Wiki # Ansible

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Contents

• Usage
  • Ad Hoc
  • Playbooks
  • Inventory
  • Vault
• Configuration
• Templating
  • YAML Files
    • ipaddr Filter
• Examples
• Troubleshooting
  • Ansible Freezes when Connecting

Usage

• Use ansible for ad hoc runs or ansible-playbook for running playbooks.
• Specify SSH password: --ask-pass
• Specify sudo password: --ask-become-pass
• Specify username: -u <username>
• Specify SSH key: --private-key=<key> (use /dev/null to explicitly avoid SSH keys)
• Hide unchanged/skipped tasks (add to your .bashrc or something): export ANSIBLE_DISPLAY_SKIPPED_HOSTS=false; export ANSIBLE_DISPLAY_OK_HOSTS=false

Ad Hoc

• Basic usage: ansible {all|<target>} -i <inventory> [-m <module>] [-a <module-arg>]
  • To specify a hostname directly and not use an inventory file, specify all -i <host>, (with the comma).
  • To run locally, specift all -i localhost, --connection=local.
• Module examples:
  • Ping: ... -m ping
  • Run command (default module): ... -a <cmd>
  • Run complicated command (example): ... -a 'bash -c "nvidia-smi > /dev/null"'
• Get facts (with optional filter): ansible <...> -m setup -a 'filter=ansible_os_*' (example fact filter)

Playbooks

• Basic: ansible-playbook <playbook>
• Specify inventory file: ansible-playbook -i <hosts> <playbook>
• Limit which groups/hosts to use (comma-separated): ansible-playbook -l <group|host> <playbook>
• Limit which tasks to run using tags (comma-separated): ansible-playbook -t <tag> <playbook>

Inventory

• See overview: ansible-inventory -i <inventory-file> --graph
• See host details: ansible-inventory -i <inventory-file> --list

Vault

• Used to encrypt files and values. For values, just paste the !vault ... output directly into the configs to use the encrypted value in.
• Use file to keep password: Just add the password as the only line in a file, e.g. ~/.ansible_vault/<name> (with appropriate parent dir perms). A generated [a-zA-Z0-9]{32} string is more than strong enough.
• Encrypt, prompt for secret, using password file: ansible-vault encrypt_string --vault-password-file=~/.ansible_vault/stuff
• Use password file with playbook: ansible-playbook --vault-password-file=<file> <...>
• To avoid leaking secrets in logs and stuff, use no_log in tasks handling secrets.

Configuration

Config locations:

• Global: /etc/ansible/ansible.cfg
• User: ~/.ansible.cfg
• Project: ansible.cfg
• Override: ANSIBLE_CONFIG=ansible.cfg
  • Required for Windows project configs due to “world-writable config”.

Example config:

[defaults]
host_key_checking = false
executable = /bin/bash
#interpreter_python = auto
interpreter_python = /usr/bin/python3
#inventory = hosts.ini
#roles_path = ansible-roles:~/.ansible/roles:/usr/share/ansible/roles:/etc/ansible/roles

Templating

YAML Files

• Indented conditionals/loops (tags) might mess up indentation for the next line. Either avoid indenting Ansible tags or specify #jinja2: trim_blocks:False at the top of the file to avoid removing the newline after a block.

ipaddr Filter

• There currently exists three versions, ipaddr (deprecated), ansible.netcommon.ipaddr (deprecated) and ansible.utils.ipaddr.
• The filter takes either a single value or a list of values. For single value input, it returns false if the input is invalid. For list input, it filters out any invalid input elements.
• Common, basic usage:
  • Normal usage: {{ some_address | ansible.utils.ipaddr('address') }}
  • Filter IPv4 or IPv6 addresses: ansible.utils.ipv4 and ansible.utils.ipv6
  • Get address without length: ansible.utils.ipaddr('address')
  • Get address with length: ansible.utils.ipaddr('host')
  • Get address with length (alternative): ansible.utils.ipaddr('address/prefix')
  • Get network without length: ansible.utils.ipaddr('network')
  • Get network with length: ansible.utils.ipaddr('subnet')
  • Get prefix length: ansible.utils.ipaddr('prefix')
  • Get netmask: ansible.utils.ipaddr('netmask')
  • Get broadcast address: ansible.utils.ipv4 | ansible.utils.ipaddr('broadcast')
  • Get addresses count: ansible.utils.ipaddr('size')
  • Get indexed address with length: ansible.utils.ipaddr('net') | ansible.utils.ipaddr(1) (-1 for last address)
  • Get the other address for a P2P link without length: ansible.utils.ipaddr('peer')
  • Convert IPv4 to IPv6 (IPv4-mapped): ansible.utils.ipv4('ipv6')
  • Filter MAC addresses: ansible.utils.hwaddr

Examples

Combine key-value pairs to string:

vars:
  qm_params:
    name: "{{ vm.name }}"
    description: "{{ vm.description | default('') }}"
  qm_params_string: "{{ vm_config.items() | map('join', '=') | map('regex_replace', '^([^=]*)=(.*)$', '--\\1=\"\\2\"') | join(' ') }}"

Troubleshooting

Ansible Freezes when Connecting

Probably caused by a password-protected SSH key. Add --private-key=<keyfile> to specify which SSH key to use or --private-key=/dev/null to avoid using any SSH key.

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