CODEWITHSUNDEEP
pythonansible
may24x
may24x

Reputation: 127

Ansible: can't set vars variable

I'm trying to build a playbook that collects certain information from my hosts. So I'll just fire-up some shell commands and store their return values in a variable. Each command output (e.g. 'ls -la') shall be concaternated to the former so if all hosts were passed I'll get a complete list.

So this is my playbook:

---
- name: try to set variable
  hosts: all

  vars:
    my_test_var: []

  tasks:

    - name: just get a simple list and show it
      shell: ls -la
      register: out
      my_test_var: "{{ my_test_var + out.stdout }}"

    - debug:
      msg: "Listing of current dir: {{ my_test_var }}"

So first I create an empty list called: "my_test_var" and the first task should append its output from the "ls -la" command.

But it doesn't. Ansible just ignores the variable. But why ?!

[WARNING]: Ignoring invalid attribute: my_test_var

Upvotes: 0

Views: 1458

Answers (1)

ilias-sp
ilias-sp

Reputation: 6685

there are a few issues with your playbook.

1:

- debug:
  msg: "Listing of current dir: {{ my_test_var }}"

msg needs one more indentation, you need to change to:

- debug:
    msg: "Listing of current dir: {{ my_test_var }}"

2:

you cant get the output from ls -al and in the same task manipulate the my_test_var. you need to use seperate tasks. PLease see my playbook below about this.

3:

the out.stdout variable is a string variable, while the my_test_var is a list. if you want to add the whole out.stdout to the list, you need to use this syntax:

my_test_var: "{{ my_test_var + [ out.stdout ] }}"

if your intention was to add the out.stdout_lines (which is a list of each line of the ls -al output), your syntax is fine:

my_test_var: "{{ my_test_var + out.stdout_lines }}"

tip:

you dont need to "initialize" the my_test_var variable to an empty list. you can use the default filter by using:

my_test_var: "{{ my_test_var|default([]) + out.stdout_lines }}"

full playbook below:

---
- name: try to set variable
  hosts: localhost
  gather_facts: false

  vars:
    # my_test_var: []

  tasks:

    - name: just get a simple list and show it
      shell: ls -la
      register: out

    - name: print out
      debug:
        var: out

    - name: set the my_test_var to the output
      set_fact:
        my_test_var: "{{ my_test_var|default([]) + out.stdout_lines }}"

    - debug:
        var: my_test_var

Upvotes: 1

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