Conditional expression if alice in ['alice', 'bob']

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1

Hi all

So close.

I’m trying to set up users by passing a list of users and a hash of user configs.

#group_vars/all
user_definitions:

  • username: alice
    uid: 1101
  • username: bob
    uid: 1102

#group_vars/web
install_users:

  • alice
  • bob

#main.yml

  • name: Install users
    user: name={{item.username}}
    when: ${item.username} in $install_users
    with_items: user_definitions

fatal: [vbox1.example.com] => Conditional expression must evaluate to True or False: {% if alice in [‘alice’, ‘bob’] %} True {% else %} False {% endif %}

I do not understand what the problem is. From the looks of the error, it looks like the first alice is a variable and the alice and bob are strings.

Any idea what I’m doing wrong?
It feels like it should be something small.

Thanks
Deon

2

You should never use legacy variables anymore except in one very rare occasion (needing deep references to things in defining other variables – the need for this even much less so on 1.4), but especially should not use them in “when” expressions.

when: item.username in install_users

much simpler!

You will notice the documentation does not make use of $foo when showing examples, so it can be a great reference.

http://ansibleworks.com/docs/playbooks_conditionals.html#id10