template – Template a file out to a remote server
template – Template a file out to a remote server
Synopsis
- Templates are processed by the Jinja2 templating language.
- Documentation on the template formatting can be found in the Template Designer Documentation.
- Additional variables listed below can be used in templates.
ansible_managed
(configurable via thedefaults
section ofansible.cfg
) contains a string which can be used to describe the template name, host, modification time of the template file and the owner uid.template_host
contains the node name of the template’s machine.template_uid
is the numeric user id of the owner.template_path
is the path of the template.template_fullpath
is the absolute path of the template.template_destpath
is the path of the template on the remote system (added in 2.8).template_run_date
is the date that the template was rendered.
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
| |
backup boolean |
|
Create a backup file including the timestamp information so you can get the original file back if you somehow clobbered it incorrectly. |
block_end_string string added in 2.4 |
Default: "%}" |
The string marking the end of a block. |
block_start_string string added in 2.4 |
Default: "{%" |
The string marking the beginning of a block. |
dest path / required |
Location to render the template to on the remote machine. | |
follow boolean added in 2.4 |
|
Determine whether symbolic links should be followed. When set to When set to Previous to Ansible 2.4, this was hardcoded as |
force boolean |
|
Determine when the file is being transferred if the destination already exists. When set to When set to |
group string |
Name of the group that should own the file/directory, as would be fed to chown. | |
lstrip_blocks boolean added in 2.6 |
|
Determine when leading spaces and tabs should be stripped. When set to This functionality requires Jinja 2.7 or newer. |
mode string |
The permissions the resulting file or directory should have. 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 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, | |
newline_sequence string added in 2.4 |
|
Specify the newline sequence to use for templating files. |
output_encoding string added in 2.7 |
Default: "utf-8" |
Overrides the encoding used to write the template file defined by It defaults to The source template file must always be encoded using |
owner string |
Name of the user that should own the file/directory, as would be fed to chown. | |
selevel string |
Default: "s0" |
The level part of the SELinux file context. This is the MLS/MCS attribute, sometimes known as the When set to |
serole string |
The role part of the SELinux file context. When set to | |
setype string |
The type part of the SELinux file context. When set to | |
seuser string |
The user part of the SELinux file context. By default it uses the When set to | |
src path / required |
Path of a Jinja2 formatted template on the Ansible controller. This can be a relative or an absolute path. The file must be encoded with | |
trim_blocks boolean added in 2.4 |
|
Determine when newlines should be removed from blocks. When set to |
unsafe_writes boolean added in 2.2 |
|
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. | |
variable_end_string string added in 2.4 |
Default: "}}" |
The string marking the end of a print statement. |
variable_start_string string added in 2.4 |
Default: "{{" |
The string marking the beginning of a print statement. |
Notes
Note
- You can use the copy module with the
content:
option if you prefer the template inline, as part of the playbook. - For Windows you can use win_template which uses ‘\r\n’ as
newline_sequence
by default. - Including a string that uses a date in the template will result in the template being marked ‘changed’ each time.
- Since Ansible 0.9, templates are loaded with
trim_blocks=True
. - Also, you can override jinja2 settings by adding a special header to template file. i.e.
#jinja2:variable_start_string:'[%', variable_end_string:'%]', trim_blocks: False
which changes the variable interpolation markers to[% var %]
instead ofTemplate:Var
. This is the best way to prevent evaluation of things that look like, but should not be Jinja2. - Using raw/endraw in Jinja2 will not work as you expect because templates in Ansible are recursively evaluated.
- To find Byte Order Marks in files, use
Format-Hex <file> -Count 16
on Windows, and useod -a -t x1 -N 16 <file>
on Linux.
See Also
See also
- copy – Copy files to remote locations
- The official documentation on the copy module.
- win_copy – Copies files to remote locations on windows hosts
- The official documentation on the win_copy module.
- win_template – Template a file out to a remote server
- The official documentation on the win_template module.
Examples
- name: Template a file to /etc/files.conf
template:
src: /mytemplates/foo.j2
dest: /etc/file.conf
owner: bin
group: wheel
mode: '0644'
- name: Template a file, using symbolic modes (equivalent to 0644)
template:
src: /mytemplates/foo.j2
dest: /etc/file.conf
owner: bin
group: wheel
mode: u=rw,g=r,o=r
- name: Copy a version of named.conf that is dependent on the OS. setype obtained by doing ls -Z /etc/named.conf on original file
template:
src: named.conf_{{ ansible_os_family}}.j2
dest: /etc/named.conf
group: named
setype: named_conf_t
mode: 0640
- name: Create a DOS-style text file from a template
template:
src: config.ini.j2
dest: /share/windows/config.ini
newline_sequence: '\r\n'
- name: Copy a new sudoers file into place, after passing validation with visudo
template:
src: /mine/sudoers
dest: /etc/sudoers
validate: /usr/sbin/visudo -cf %s
- name: Update sshd configuration safely, avoid locking yourself out
template:
src: etc/ssh/sshd_config.j2
dest: /etc/ssh/sshd_config
owner: root
group: root
mode: '0600'
validate: /usr/sbin/sshd -t -f %s
backup: yes
Status
- This module is guaranteed to have no backward incompatible interface changes going forward. [stableinterface]
- This module is maintained by the Ansible Core Team. [core]
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
© 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/template_module.html