Ansible-Ruby

Attempts to create a Ruby DSL on top of Ansible's YML files. Currently this is against Ansible 2.1.2.0.

• Creates a Ruby DSL that compiles .rb files to YML on a file by file basis
• Type validation
• Assists with basic syntax regarding register
• Offers a Rake task to assist in easily generating YML files from dependent Ruby files

YAML is OK but can suffer from the same problems that exist with any markup language. If you can write in a first class language that is syntaxually easier, that might be of some benefit.

It's a productive language for me that's easy to write DSLs in. One could argue that more strongly typed languages like Crystal could be better fit for this.

Python is widely installed (probably moreso than Ruby :()) on machines to be managed. We recognize Ansible's choice here. This tool does not try and change how Ansible modules work. It only tries to avoid editing lots of YML directly.

Install Ruby+Bundler (this was tested with Ruby 2.2.5), then add ansible-ruby to your Gemfile:

gem 'ansible-ruby'

Nothing changes here. Lay out playbooks/etc. like you would normally. There are 2 places right now where you can use ansible-ruby files.

1. Playbooks (either with role references or embedded tasks)
2. Tasks within roles

Ansible-ruby does NOT stray beyond the boundaries of a normal Ansible YAML file. Nothing magic with includes, etc.

Here is a playbook with a single play:

play 'the play name' do
  hosts %w(host1 host2)

  task 'Copy something over' do
    result = copy do
      src '/file1.conf'
      dest '/file2.conf'
    end

    become
    notify 'handler1'
    changed_when "'no upgrade' in #{result.stdout}"
  end

  user 'centos'
end

This will be automatically translated to:

---
# This is a generated YAML file by ansible-ruby, DO NOT EDIT
- hosts: host1:host2
  name: the play name
  tasks:
  - name: Copy something over
    copy:
      src: "/file1.conf"
      dest: "/file2.conf"
    become: true
    register: result_1
    changed_when: "'no upgrade' in result_1.stdout"
    notify:
    - handler1
  user: centos

There is also a shortcut for a localhost/local connection play.

play 'command fun' do
  local_host
  
  task 'say hello' do
    command 'ls howdy'
  end
end

Compiles to:

---
# This is a generated YAML file by ansible-ruby, DO NOT EDIT
- hosts: localhost
  name: command fun
  tasks:
  - name: say hello
    command: ls howdy
  connection: local

Note this is using a tiny bit of Ruby AST-ish syntax with the result variables to make working them more friendly. There is more work to do on this see issue.

You can see more examples in the examples/ directory in the repository.

You can invoke all of this via a Rake task. The Rake task will, by convention, look for any .rb files under roles/role_name/tasks/*.rb and transform those as well:

require 'ansible/ruby/rake/tasks'

desc 'named ansible task'
Ansible::Ruby::Rake::Execute.new :stuff do |task|
  task.playbooks = 'lib/ansible/ruby/rake/sample_test.rb'
end

Ruby code within this project parses the YAML documentation in Ansible's modules and creates model classes in Ruby to assist with validation. All of them are there but some of them might need some work.

• Light variable AST (see examples)
• Helps with registering a variable in 1 task and using in another (see image_copy example)
• Type normalization in modules (e.g. allow arrays to be passed in if a given module is expecting CSV)

There's no reason why you can't use Ansible Galaxy with this. It hasn't been tested much but since this tool stays within the task/playbook/etc. boundary, it should work fine to use Galaxy roles from ansible-ruby playbooks or even to build Galaxy roles with ansible-ruby.

• Type validation in generated modules isn't 100% correct. I try and fix modules as I discover the,
• Error messages could use improvement - see issue
• Result variable DSL is fairly limited, all it does right now is make sure you use the right variable name (see issues for improvements)

Copyright (c) 2016, BSW Technology Consulting LLC All rights reserved.

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