Exercise - Surveys
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Table Contents
- Objective
- Guide
- The Apache-configuration Role
- Create a Template with a Survey
- Launch the Template
- What About Some Practice?
Objective
Demonstrate the use of Ansible Tower survey feature. Surveys set extra variables for the playbook similar to ‘Prompt for Extra Variables’ does, but in a user-friendly question and answer way. Surveys also allow for validation of user input.
Guide
You have installed Apache on all hosts in the job you just run. Now we’re going to extend on this:
-
Use a proper role which has a Jinja2 template to deploy an
index.htmlfile. -
Create a job Template with a survey to collect the values for the
index.htmltemplate. -
Launch the job Template
Additionally, the role will also make sure that the Apache configuration is properly set up - in case it got mixed up during the other exercises.
Tip
The survey feature only provides a simple query for data - it does not support four-eye principles, queries based on dynamic data or nested menus.
The Apache-configuration Role
The Playbook and the role with the Jinja template already exist in the Github repository https://github.com/ansible/workshop-examples in the directory rhel/apache.
Head over to the Github UI and have a look at the content: the playbook apache_role_install.yml merely references the role. The role can be found in the roles/role_apache subdirectory.
- Inside the role, note the two variables in the
templates/index.html.j2template file marked by ``. - Also, check out the tasks in
tasks/main.ymlthat deploy the file from the template.
What is this Playbook doing? It creates a file (dest) on the managed hosts from the template (src).
The role also deploys a static configuration for Apache. This is to make sure that all changes done in the previous chapters are overwritten and your examples work properly.
Because the Playbook and role is located in the same Github repo as the apache_install.yml Playbook you don’t have to configure a new project for this exercise.
Create a Template with a Survey
Now you create a new Template that includes a survey.
Create Template
-
Go to Templates, click the
button and choose Job Template -
Fill out the following information:
| Parameter | Value |
|---|---|
| NAME | Create index.html |
| JOB TYPE | Run |
| INVENTORY | Workshop Inventory |
| Project | Workshop Project |
| PLAYBOOK | rhel/apache/apache_role_install.yml |
| CREDENTIAL | Workshop Credentials |
| LIMIT | web |
| OPTIONS | Enable Privilege Escalation |
- Click SAVE
Warning
Do not run the template yet!
Add the Survey
-
In the Template, click the ADD SURVEY button
-
Under ADD SURVEY PROMPT fill in:
| Parameter | Value |
|---|---|
| PROMPT | First Line |
| ANSWER VARIABLE NAME | first_line |
| ANSWER TYPE | Text |
-
Click +ADD
-
In the same way add a second Survey Prompt
| Parameter | Value |
|---|---|
| PROMPT | Second Line |
| ANSWER VARIABLE NAME | second_line |
| ANSWER TYPE | Text |
-
Click +ADD
-
Click SAVE for the Survey
-
Click SAVE for the Template
Launch the Template
Now launch Create index.html job template.
Before the actual launch the survey will ask for First Line and Second Line. Fill in some text and click Next. The next window shows the values, if all is good run the Job by clicking Launch.
Tip
Note how the two survey lines are shown to the left of the Job view as Extra Variables.
After the job has completed, check the Apache homepage. In the SSH console on the control host, execute curl against the IP address of your node1:
$ curl http://22.33.44.55
<body>
<h1>Apache is running fine</h1>
<h1>This is survey field "First Line": line one</h1>
<h1>This is survey field "Second Line": line two</h1>
</body>
Note how the two variables where used by the playbook to create the content of the index.html file.
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