10 Easy To Use Modules In Ansible

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Ansible is all about using modules in its playbook.

Here are my top 10 commonly used modules:-

Before reading this blog I would like to explain some terminologies used below:-

test-servers:- It is the group of my hosts which I have written in my inventory file.

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	[test-servers]
	18.223.152.37
	18.191.108.32
	18.222.226.59

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2. – m XYZ:- XYZ is the module name

3. -u ec2-user:- to define username that is ec2-user

4. SUCCESS:- means that my module has done its task on destination nodes.

5. Changed:- If it is true something is changed on destination nodes.

If it is false something is not changed on destination nodes.

Let’s start with modules:-

ping module:- Used when we want to check whether the connection with our hosts defined in my inventory file is established or not.

Command :- ansible test-servers -m ping -u ec2-user

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	18.191.108.32 \| SUCCESS => {
	"changed": false,
	"ping": "pong"
	}
	18.223.152.37 \| SUCCESS => {
	"changed": false,
	"ping": "pong"
	}
	18.222.226.59 \| SUCCESS => {
	"changed": false,
	"ping": "pong"
	}

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ping changes to pong which means ssh connection is established.

2. Setup module:- Used when we want to see the information of our all the hosts their configuration and detailed information.

Command :- ansible test-servers -m setup -u ec2-user

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	18.223.152.37 \| SUCCESS => {
	"ansible_facts": {
	"ansible_all_ipv4_addresses": [
	"172.31.24.96"
	],
	"ansible_all_ipv6_addresses": [
	"fe80::4e3:8bff:fec0:80bc"
	],
	"ansible_apparmor": {
	"status": "disabled"
	},

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This is the snapshot of the configuration of my machine running on AWS.

3. Copy module:- Often used in writing playbooks when we want to copy a file from remote server to destination nodes.
Example:- Suppose we want to copy a file from a remote server to all destination machines.

Command :- ansible test-servers -m copy -a 'src=/home/knoldus/Personal/blogs/blog3.txt dest=/tmp' -u ec2-user

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	18.223.152.37 \| SUCCESS => {
	"changed": true,
	"checksum": "2274510a91dabeef3ca39083104d1544c218129b",
	"dest": "/tmp/blog3.txt",
	"gid": 1000,
	"group": "ec2-user",
	"md5sum": "a74feaac59d7c23f40cff5ea1e7baece",
	"mode": "0664",
	"owner": "ec2-user",
	"secontext": "unconfined_u:object_r:user_home_t:s0",
	"size": 2512,
	"src": "/home/ec2-user/.ansible/tmp/ansible-tmp-1538636902.09-174963264765242/source",
	"state": "file",
	"uid": 1000
	}

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4. Yum module:- To install a service we use Yum module

Command:- ansible test-servers -m yum -a 'name=httpd state=present' -become -u ec2-user

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	18.223.152.37 \| SUCCESS => {
	"changed": true,
	"msg": "",
	"rc": 0,
	"results": [
	"Loaded plugins: amazon-id, rhui-lb, search-disabled-repos\nResolving Dependencies\n–> Running transaction check\n—> Package httpd.x86_64 0:2.4.6-80.el7_5.1 will be installed\n–> Finished Dependency Resolution\n\nDependencies Resolved\n\n================================================================================\n Package Arch Version Repository Size\n================================================================================\nInstalling:\n httpd x86_64 2.4.6-80.el7_5.1 rhui-REGION-rhel-server-releases 1.2 M\n\nTransaction Summary\n================================================================================\nInstall 1 Package\n\nTotal download size: 1.2 M\nInstalled size: 3.7 M\nDownloading packages:\nRunning transaction check\nRunning transaction test\nTransaction test succeeded\nRunning transaction\n Installing : httpd-2.4.6-80.el7_5.1.x86_64 1/1 \n Verifying : httpd-2.4.6-80.el7_5.1.x86_64 1/1 \n\nInstalled:\n httpd.x86_64 0:2.4.6-80.el7_5.1 \n\nComplete!\n"
	]
	}

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Apache2 will be installed in our machines.

The key point to note here is that we have to use -become which is new in 2.6 version before we have to use -s.

5. Shell module:- When we want to run UNIX commands then we use shell module

Command:- ansible test-servers -m shell -a 'ls -la' -u ec2-user

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	18.191.108.32 \| SUCCESS \| rc=0 >>
	total 16
	drwx——. 5 ec2-user ec2-user 123 Oct 3 06:47 .
	drwxr-xr-x. 3 root root 22 Sep 28 10:16 ..
	drwx——. 3 ec2-user ec2-user 17 Oct 1 07:18 .ansible
	-rw——-. 1 ec2-user ec2-user 73 Oct 1 07:13 .bash_history
	-rw-r–r–. 1 ec2-user ec2-user 18 Sep 26 2017 .bash_logout
	-rw-r–r–. 1 ec2-user ec2-user 193 Sep 26 2017 .bash_profile
	-rw-r–r–. 1 ec2-user ec2-user 231 Sep 26 2017 .bashrc
	drwxrw—-. 3 ec2-user ec2-user 19 Oct 3 06:47 .pki
	drwx——. 2 ec2-user ec2-user 29 Oct 1 07:12 .ssh

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This will display all the files present in our machine with their permissions.

6. Service module:- When we want to ensure the state of a service that is service is running we use the service module.

Command:- ansible test-servers -m service -a 'name=httpd state=started' -become -u ec2-user

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	18.223.152.37 \| SUCCESS => {
	"changed": true,
	"name": "httpd",
	"state": "started",
	"status": {
	"ActiveEnterTimestampMonotonic": "0",
	"ActiveExitTimestampMonotonic": "0",
	"ActiveState": "inactive",
	"After": "nss-lookup.target tmp.mount -.mount system.slice network.target basic.target remote-fs.target systemd-journald.socket",
	"AllowIsolate": "no",
	"AmbientCapabilities": "0",
	"AssertResult": "no",
	"AssertTimestampMonotonic": "0",
	"Before": "shutdown.target",
	"BlockIOAccounting": "no",
	"BlockIOWeight": "18446744073709551615",
	"CPUAccounting": "no",

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Apache2 is up on my machine.

7.Debug module:- To print a msg on hosts we use Debug module.

Command:- ansible test-servers -m debug -a 'msg=Hello' -u ec2-user

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	18.223.152.37 \| SUCCESS => {
	"msg": "Hello"
	}
	18.191.108.32 \| SUCCESS => {
	"msg": "Hello"
	}
	18.222.226.59 \| SUCCESS => {
	"msg": "Hello"
	}

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Hello, a message is printed on my machine.

8. Template module:- It is used to copy a configuration file from the local system to the host server.

It is the same as the copy module but it dynamically binds group variables defined by us.

Here I have vars in my source machine.

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	—
	– name: Use test-servers
	hosts: test-servers
	become: yes
	become_user: root
	vars:
	source: /home/knoldus/Personal/blogs/Ansible/blog1.txt
	destination: /tmp
	tasks:
	– name: copy local files to remote machines
	template:
	src: "{{ source }}"
	dest: "{{ destination }}"
	owner: root
	group: root