# Better output for ad-hoc commands? **URL:** \ **Category:** Ansible Project\ **Created:** [October 30, 2014, 6:26pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/better-output-for-ad-hoc-commands/16647 "2014-10-30T18:26:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Alex\_Scoble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3e96dc/32.png) [@Alex\_Scoble](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Alex_Scoble)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2014, 6:26pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/better-output-for-ad-hoc-commands/16647/1 "2014-10-30T18:26:19Z")
Is there any way to get Ansible to provide cleaner/human readable output when running ad-hoc commands? Sometimes, particularly when output of a process is voluminous, it drops newlines and munges everything together. Using -v doesn’t help. Thanks, Alex ---
**Author:** ![Michael\_DeHaan1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5e9695/32.png) [@Michael\_DeHaan1](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Michael_DeHaan1)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2014, 7:42pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/better-output-for-ad-hoc-commands/16647/2 "2014-10-30T19:42:56Z")
There is not currently. The output is basically JSON though for command/shell modules it presents things a bit more organized. Open to thoughts though! ---
**Author:** ![Tomasz\_Kontusz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@Tomasz\_Kontusz](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Tomasz_Kontusz)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2014, 8:17pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/better-output-for-ad-hoc-commands/16647/3 "2014-10-30T20:17:51Z")
Not core Ansible, but you can take a look at [https://github.com/dominis/ansible-shell](https://github.com/dominis/ansible-shell) - it looks a bit better, but still won’t help you with big amount of hosts. Alex Scoble [bloggingitguy@gmail.com](mailto:bloggingitguy@gmail.com) napisał: ---
**Author:** ![Michael\_DeHaan1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5e9695/32.png) [@Michael\_DeHaan1](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Michael_DeHaan1)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2014, 9:10pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/better-output-for-ad-hoc-commands/16647/4 "2014-10-30T21:10:15Z")
Yeah there are some comments on the PR about ansible-shell about what it takes to get this into core. All being said, it’s a different way of operations. ---
**Author:** ![Alex\_Scoble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3e96dc/32.png) [@Alex\_Scoble](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Alex_Scoble)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2014, 9:17pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/better-output-for-ad-hoc-commands/16647/5 "2014-10-30T21:17:46Z")
Thanks Tomasz, I’ll try it and let you all know if it solves my problem, but just playing with it for a few moments it does look pretty cool. Thanks, Alex ---
**Author:** ![Alex\_Scoble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3e96dc/32.png) [@Alex\_Scoble](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Alex_Scoble)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2014, 9:48pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/better-output-for-ad-hoc-commands/16647/6 "2014-10-30T21:48:26Z")
Tomasz, Is there any better documentation for ansible-shell available anywhere? They don’t explain at all what the serial setting is for or how to pass commands to the current group. Thanks, Alex ---
**Author:** ![Alex\_Scoble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3e96dc/32.png) [@Alex\_Scoble](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Alex_Scoble)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2014, 10:41pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/better-output-for-ad-hoc-commands/16647/7 "2014-10-30T22:41:12Z")
Figured out that “serial” is number of forks. I kind of guessed, but didn’t want to assume anything. Thanks, Alex ---
**Author:** ![Alex\_Scoble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3e96dc/32.png) [@Alex\_Scoble](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Alex_Scoble)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2014, 11:08pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/better-output-for-ad-hoc-commands/16647/8 "2014-10-30T23:08:39Z")
Tomasz, Unfortunately, it looks like currently there’s no way to set ansible-shell to do --sudo-ask-pass or --ask-pass which makes it a non-starter for our network. Thanks, Alex ---
**Author:** ![Michael\_DeHaan1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5e9695/32.png) [@Michael\_DeHaan1](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Michael_DeHaan1)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2014, 2:45pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/better-output-for-ad-hoc-commands/16647/9 "2014-11-01T14:45:50Z")
Hi, ansible-shell is not part of ansible (yet anyway), so the best place to ask questions about it would be it’s github tracker.