amazon.aws.aws_ec2 – EC2 inventory source

Note

This plugin is part of the amazon.aws collection (version 1.5.1).

You might already have this collection installed if you are using the ansible package. It is not included in ansible-core. To check whether it is installed, run ansible-galaxy collection list.

To install it, use: ansible-galaxy collection install amazon.aws.

To use it in a playbook, specify: amazon.aws.aws_ec2.

Synopsis

  • Get inventory hosts from Amazon Web Services EC2.
  • Uses a YAML configuration file that ends with aws_ec2.(yml|yaml).

Requirements

The below requirements are needed on the local controller node that executes this inventory.

  • boto3
  • botocore

Parameters

Parameter Choices/Defaults Configuration Comments
aws_access_key
string
env:EC2_ACCESS_KEY
env:AWS_ACCESS_KEY
env:AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID
The AWS access key to use.

aliases: aws_access_key_id
aws_profile
string
env:AWS_DEFAULT_PROFILE
env:AWS_PROFILE
The AWS profile

aliases: boto_profile
aws_secret_key
string
env:EC2_SECRET_KEY
env:AWS_SECRET_KEY
env:AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY
The AWS secret key that corresponds to the access key.

aliases: aws_secret_access_key
aws_security_token
string
env:EC2_SECURITY_TOKEN
env:AWS_SESSION_TOKEN
env:AWS_SECURITY_TOKEN
The AWS security token if using temporary access and secret keys.
cache
boolean
    Choices:
  • no
  • yes
ini entries:

[inventory]
cache = no

env:ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_CACHE
Toggle to enable/disable the caching of the inventory's source data, requires a cache plugin setup to work.
cache_connection
string
ini entries:

[defaults]
fact_caching_connection = None

[inventory]
cache_connection = None

env:ANSIBLE_CACHE_PLUGIN_CONNECTION
env:ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_CACHE_CONNECTION
Cache connection data or path, read cache plugin documentation for specifics.
cache_plugin
string
Default:
"memory"
ini entries:

[defaults]
fact_caching = memory

[inventory]
cache_plugin = memory

env:ANSIBLE_CACHE_PLUGIN
env:ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_CACHE_PLUGIN
Cache plugin to use for the inventory's source data.
cache_prefix
string
Default:
"ansible_inventory_"
ini entries:

[default]
fact_caching_prefix = ansible_inventory_

[inventory]
cache_prefix = ansible_inventory_

env:ANSIBLE_CACHE_PLUGIN_PREFIX
env:ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_CACHE_PLUGIN_PREFIX
Prefix to use for cache plugin files/tables
cache_timeout
integer
Default:
3600
ini entries:

[defaults]
fact_caching_timeout = 3600

[inventory]
cache_timeout = 3600

env:ANSIBLE_CACHE_PLUGIN_TIMEOUT
env:ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_CACHE_TIMEOUT
Cache duration in seconds
compose
dictionary
Default:
{}
Create vars from jinja2 expressions.
exclude_filters
list / elements=string
Default:
[]
A list of filters. Any instances matching one of the filters are excluded from the result.
The filters from exclude_filters take priority over the include_filters and filters keys
Every entry in this list triggers a search query. As such, from a performance point of view, it's better to keep the list as short as possible.
filters
dictionary
Default:
{}
A dictionary of filter value pairs.
groups
dictionary
Default:
{}
Add hosts to group based on Jinja2 conditionals.
hostnames
list / elements=string
Default:
[]
A list in order of precedence for hostname variables.
To use tags as hostnames use the syntax tag:Name=Value to use the hostname Name_Value, or tag:Name to use the value of the Name tag.
iam_role_arn
string
The ARN of the IAM role to assume to perform the inventory lookup. You should still provide AWS credentials with enough privilege to perform the AssumeRole action.
include_extra_api_calls
boolean
    Choices:
  • no
  • yes
Add two additional API calls for every instance to include 'persistent' and 'events' host variables.
Spot instances may be persistent and instances may have associated events.
include_filters
list / elements=string
Default:
[]
A list of filters. Any instances matching at least one of the filters are included in the result.
Every entry in this list triggers a search query. As such, from a performance point of view, it's better to keep the list as short as possible.
keyed_groups
list / elements=string
Default:
[]
Add hosts to group based on the values of a variable.
leading_separator
boolean
added in 2.11 of ansible.builtin
    Choices:
  • no
  • yes
Use in conjunction with keyed_groups.
By default, a keyed group that does not have a prefix or a separator provided will have a name that starts with an underscore.
This is because the default prefix is "" and the default separator is "_".
Set this option to False to omit the leading underscore (or other separator) if no prefix is given.
If the group name is derived from a mapping the separator is still used to concatenate the items.
To not use a separator in the group name at all, set the separator for the keyed group to an empty string instead.
plugin
string / required
    Choices:
  • aws_ec2
  • amazon.aws.aws_ec2
Token that ensures this is a source file for the plugin.
regions
list / elements=string
Default:
[]
A list of regions in which to describe EC2 instances.
If empty (the default) default this will include all regions, except possibly restricted ones like us-gov-west-1 and cn-north-1.
strict
boolean
    Choices:
  • no
  • yes
If yes make invalid entries a fatal error, otherwise skip and continue.
Since it is possible to use facts in the expressions they might not always be available and we ignore those errors by default.
strict_permissions
boolean
    Choices:
  • no
  • yes
By default if a 403 (Forbidden) error code is encountered this plugin will fail.
You can set this option to False in the inventory config file which will allow 403 errors to be gracefully skipped.
use_contrib_script_compatible_ec2_tag_keys
boolean
    Choices:
  • no
  • yes
Expose the host tags with ec2_tag_TAGNAME keys like the old ec2.py inventory script.
The use of this feature is discouraged and we advise to migrate to the new ``tags`` structure.
use_contrib_script_compatible_sanitization
boolean
    Choices:
  • no
  • yes
By default this plugin is using a general group name sanitization to create safe and usable group names for use in Ansible. This option allows you to override that, in efforts to allow migration from the old inventory script and matches the sanitization of groups when the script's ``replace_dash_in_groups`` option is set to ``False``. To replicate behavior of ``replace_dash_in_groups = True`` with constructed groups, you will need to replace hyphens with underscores via the regex_replace filter for those entries.
For this to work you should also turn off the TRANSFORM_INVALID_GROUP_CHARS setting, otherwise the core engine will just use the standard sanitization on top.
This is not the default as such names break certain functionality as not all characters are valid Python identifiers which group names end up being used as.
use_extra_vars
boolean
added in 2.11 of ansible.builtin
    Choices:
  • no
  • yes
ini entries:

[inventory_plugins]
use_extra_vars = no

env:ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_USE_EXTRA_VARS
Merge extra vars into the available variables for composition (highest precedence).

Notes

Note

  • If no credentials are provided and the control node has an associated IAM instance profile then the role will be used for authentication.

Examples

# Minimal example using environment vars or instance role credentials
# Fetch all hosts in us-east-1, the hostname is the public DNS if it exists, otherwise the private IP address
plugin: aws_ec2
regions:
  - us-east-1

# Example using filters, ignoring permission errors, and specifying the hostname precedence
plugin: aws_ec2
# The values for profile, access key, secret key and token can be hardcoded like:
boto_profile: aws_profile
# or you could use Jinja as:
# boto_profile: "{{ lookup('env', 'AWS_PROFILE') | default('aws_profile', true) }}"
# Populate inventory with instances in these regions
regions:
  - us-east-1
  - us-east-2
filters:
  # All instances with their `Environment` tag set to `dev`
  tag:Environment: dev
  # All dev and QA hosts
  tag:Environment:
    - dev
    - qa
  instance.group-id: sg-xxxxxxxx
# Ignores 403 errors rather than failing
strict_permissions: False
# Note: I(hostnames) sets the inventory_hostname. To modify ansible_host without modifying
# inventory_hostname use compose (see example below).
hostnames:
  - tag:Name=Tag1,Name=Tag2  # Return specific hosts only
  - tag:CustomDNSName
  - dns-name
  - name: 'tag:Name=Tag1,Name=Tag2'
  - name: 'private-ip-address'
    separator: '_'
    prefix: 'tag:Name'

# Example using constructed features to create groups and set ansible_host
plugin: aws_ec2
regions:
  - us-east-1
  - us-west-1
# keyed_groups may be used to create custom groups
strict: False
keyed_groups:
  # Add e.g. x86_64 hosts to an arch_x86_64 group
  - prefix: arch
    key: 'architecture'
  # Add hosts to tag_Name_Value groups for each Name/Value tag pair
  - prefix: tag
    key: tags
  # Add hosts to e.g. instance_type_z3_tiny
  - prefix: instance_type
    key: instance_type
  # Create security_groups_sg_abcd1234 group for each SG
  - key: 'security_groups|json_query("[].group_id")'
    prefix: 'security_groups'
  # Create a group for each value of the Application tag
  - key: tags.Application
    separator: ''
  # Create a group per region e.g. aws_region_us_east_2
  - key: placement.region
    prefix: aws_region
  # Create a group (or groups) based on the value of a custom tag "Role" and add them to a metagroup called "project"
  - key: tags['Role']
    prefix: foo
    parent_group: "project"
# Set individual variables with compose
compose:
  # Use the private IP address to connect to the host
  # (note: this does not modify inventory_hostname, which is set via I(hostnames))
  ansible_host: private_ip_address

# Example using include_filters and exclude_filters to compose the inventory.
plugin: aws_ec2
regions:
  - us-east-1
  - us-west-1
include_filters:
- tag:Name:
  - 'my_second_tag'
- tag:Name:
  - 'my_third_tag'
exclude_filters:
- tag:Name:
  - 'my_first_tag'

Authors

  • Sloane Hertel (@s-hertel)

© 2012–2018 Michael DeHaan
© 2018–2021 Red Hat, Inc.
Licensed under the GNU General Public License version 3.
https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/latest/collections/amazon/aws/aws_ec2_inventory.html