copy – Copy files to remote locations

From Get docs
Ansible/docs/2.8/modules/copy module


copy – Copy files to remote locations

Synopsis

  • The copy module copies a file from the local or remote machine to a location on the remote machine.
  • Use the fetch module to copy files from remote locations to the local box.
  • If you need variable interpolation in copied files, use the template module. Using a variable in the content field will result in unpredictable output.
  • For Windows targets, use the win_copy module instead.

Parameters

Parameter Choices/Defaults Comments

attributes

string

added in 2.3

The attributes the resulting file or directory should have.

To get supported flags look at the man page for chattr on the target system.

This string should contain the attributes in the same order as the one displayed by lsattr.

The = operator is assumed as default, otherwise + or - operators need to be included in the string.


aliases: attr

backup

boolean

  • no

  • yes

Create a backup file including the timestamp information so you can get the original file back if you somehow clobbered it incorrectly.

checksum

string

added in 2.5

SHA1 checksum of the file being transferred.

Used to validate that the copy of the file was successful.

If this is not provided, ansible will use the local calculated checksum of the src file.

content

string

When used instead of src, sets the contents of a file directly to the specified value.

For advanced formatting or if content contains a variable, use the template module.

decrypt

boolean

added in 2.4

  • no
  • yes

This option controls the autodecryption of source files using vault.

dest

path / required

Remote absolute path where the file should be copied to.

If src is a directory, this must be a directory too.

If dest is a non-existent path and if either dest ends with "/" or src is a directory, dest is created.

If dest is a relative path, the starting directory is determined by the remote host.

If src and dest are files, the parent directory of dest is not created and the task fails if it does not already exist.

directory_mode

raw

When doing a recursive copy set the mode for the directories.

If this is not set we will use the system defaults.

The mode is only set on directories which are newly created, and will not affect those that already existed.

follow

boolean

  • no

  • yes

This flag indicates that filesystem links in the destination, if they exist, should be followed.

force

boolean

  • no
  • yes

Influence whether the remote file must always be replaced.

If yes, the remote file will be replaced when contents are different than the source.

If no, the file will only be transferred if the destination does not exist.


aliases: thirsty

group

string

Name of the group that should own the file/directory, as would be fed to chown.

local_follow

boolean

added in 2.4

  • no
  • yes

This flag indicates that filesystem links in the source tree, if they exist, should be followed.

mode

path

The permissions of the destination file or directory.

For those used to /usr/bin/chmod remember that modes are actually octal numbers. You must either add a leading zero so that Ansible's YAML parser knows it is an octal number (like 0644 or 01777)or quote it (like '644' or '1777') so Ansible receives a string and can do its own conversion from string into number. Giving Ansible a number without following one of these rules will end up with a decimal number which will have unexpected results.

As of Ansible 1.8, the mode may be specified as a symbolic mode (for example, u+rwx or u=rw,g=r,o=r).

As of Ansible 2.3, the mode may also be the special string preserve.

preserve means that the file will be given the same permissions as the source file.

owner

string

Name of the user that should own the file/directory, as would be fed to chown.

remote_src

boolean

added in 2.0

  • no

  • yes

Influence whether src needs to be transferred or already is present remotely.

If no, it will search for src at originating/master machine.

If yes it will go to the remote/target machine for the src.

remote_src supports recursive copying as of version 2.8.

remote_src only works with mode=preserve as of version 2.6.

selevel

string

Default:

"s0"

The level part of the SELinux file context.

This is the MLS/MCS attribute, sometimes known as the range.

When set to _default, it will use the level portion of the policy if available.

serole

string

The role part of the SELinux file context.

When set to _default, it will use the role portion of the policy if available.

setype

string

The type part of the SELinux file context.

When set to _default, it will use the type portion of the policy if available.

seuser

string

The user part of the SELinux file context.

By default it uses the system policy, where applicable.

When set to _default, it will use the user portion of the policy if available.

src

path

Local path to a file to copy to the remote server.

This can be absolute or relative.

If path is a directory, it is copied recursively. In this case, if path ends with "/", only inside contents of that directory are copied to destination. Otherwise, if it does not end with "/", the directory itself with all contents is copied. This behavior is similar to the rsync command line tool.

unsafe_writes

boolean

added in 2.2

  • no

  • yes

Influence when to use atomic operation to prevent data corruption or inconsistent reads from the target file.

By default this module uses atomic operations to prevent data corruption or inconsistent reads from the target files, but sometimes systems are configured or just broken in ways that prevent this. One example is docker mounted files, which cannot be updated atomically from inside the container and can only be written in an unsafe manner.

This option allows Ansible to fall back to unsafe methods of updating files when atomic operations fail (however, it doesn't force Ansible to perform unsafe writes).

IMPORTANT! Unsafe writes are subject to race conditions and can lead to data corruption.

validate

string

The validation command to run before copying into place.

The path to the file to validate is passed in via '%s' which must be present as in the examples below.

The command is passed securely so shell features like expansion and pipes will not work.



Notes

Note

  • The copy module recursively copy facility does not scale to lots (>hundreds) of files.


See Also

See also

assemble – Assemble configuration files from fragments
The official documentation on the assemble module.
fetch – Fetch files from remote nodes
The official documentation on the fetch module.
file – Manage files and file properties
The official documentation on the file module.
synchronize – A wrapper around rsync to make common tasks in your playbooks quick and easy
The official documentation on the synchronize module.
template – Template a file out to a remote server
The official documentation on the template module.
win_copy – Copies files to remote locations on windows hosts
The official documentation on the win_copy module.


Examples

- name: Copy file with owner and permissions
  copy:
    src: /srv/myfiles/foo.conf
    dest: /etc/foo.conf
    owner: foo
    group: foo
    mode: '0644'

- name: Copy file with owner and permission, using symbolic representation
  copy:
    src: /srv/myfiles/foo.conf
    dest: /etc/foo.conf
    owner: foo
    group: foo
    mode: u=rw,g=r,o=r

- name: Another symbolic mode example, adding some permissions and removing others
  copy:
    src: /srv/myfiles/foo.conf
    dest: /etc/foo.conf
    owner: foo
    group: foo
    mode: u+rw,g-wx,o-rwx

- name: Copy a new "ntp.conf file into place, backing up the original if it differs from the copied version
  copy:
    src: /mine/ntp.conf
    dest: /etc/ntp.conf
    owner: root
    group: root
    mode: '0644'
    backup: yes

- name: Copy a new "sudoers" file into place, after passing validation with visudo
  copy:
    src: /mine/sudoers
    dest: /etc/sudoers
    validate: /usr/sbin/visudo -cf %s

- name: Copy a "sudoers" file on the remote machine for editing
  copy:
    src: /etc/sudoers
    dest: /etc/sudoers.edit
    remote_src: yes
    validate: /usr/sbin/visudo -cf %s

- name: Copy using inline content
  copy:
    content: '# This file was moved to /etc/other.conf'
    dest: /etc/mine.conf

- name: If follow=yes, /path/to/file will be overwritten by contents of foo.conf
  copy:
    src: /etc/foo.conf
    dest: /path/to/link  # link to /path/to/file
    follow: yes

- name: If follow=no, /path/to/link will become a file and be overwritten by contents of foo.conf
  copy:
    src: /etc/foo.conf
    dest: /path/to/link  # link to /path/to/file
    follow: no

Return Values

Common return values are documented here, the following are the fields unique to this module:

Key Returned Description

backup_file

string

changed and if backup=yes

Name of backup file created


Sample:

/path/to/file.txt.2015-02-12@22:09~

checksum

string

success

SHA1 checksum of the file after running copy


Sample:

6e642bb8dd5c2e027bf21dd923337cbb4214f827

dest

string

success

Destination file/path


Sample:

/path/to/file.txt

gid

integer

success

Group id of the file, after execution


Sample:

100

group

string

success

Group of the file, after execution


Sample:

httpd

md5sum

string

when supported

MD5 checksum of the file after running copy


Sample:

2a5aeecc61dc98c4d780b14b330e3282

mode

string

success

Permissions of the target, after execution


Sample:

420

owner

string

success

Owner of the file, after execution


Sample:

httpd

size

integer

success

Size of the target, after execution


Sample:

1220

src

string

changed

Source file used for the copy on the target machine


Sample:

/home/httpd/.ansible/tmp/ansible-tmp-1423796390.97-147729857856000/source

state

string

success

State of the target, after execution


Sample:

file

uid

integer

success

Owner id of the file, after execution


Sample:

100




Status

Red Hat Support

More information about Red Hat’s support of this module is available from this Red Hat Knowledge Base article.

Authors

  • Ansible Core Team
  • Michael DeHaan

Hint

If you notice any issues in this documentation you can edit this document to improve it.


© 2012–2018 Michael DeHaan
© 2018–2019 Red Hat, Inc.
Licensed under the GNU General Public License version 3.
https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/2.8/modules/copy_module.html