Docker Inventory Module + Configuration

Archives Ansible Developer
1

Hey guys,

I’m in the process of wrapping up on a Docker inventory plugin, but before I open a pull request, I wanted to check about something.

Here’s a link for those interested: https://github.com/angstwad/ansible/tree/docker_inv/plugins/inventory

The question is about my use of a YAML-formatted confuration file. Note, this is in addition to supporting environment variables. I noticed that nearly all the modules in Inventory are using INI-formatted files, but this is probably because their dependent libraries support INI-formatted config files. Since docker-py has no such support, I figured I’d go with YAML files. The YAML config file enumerates Docker hosts and options, and a defaults section that could apply to all hosts.

tl;dr: I use a YAML file for enumerating Docker hosts. Everything else seems to use INI. INI files are (mostly) dumb.

Thanks!

2

If you think it needs structured data that seems reasonable…

The hosts section being blank in the sample file is a bit confusing to me, maybe include some commented out hosts?

Note in reading the code inventory plugins don’t have a DOCUMENTATION section for auto-generated docs so you can drop that boilerplate, instead include notes on configuration as docs in the config file. Otherwise it’s a bit confusing as I’m reading the docs expecting it to be a module, and it’s unclear what the config file might look like.

(Do I read the source correctly that this will be able to index containers running on multiple hosts? If so, this would be very very good – it seems also nice if it would return the lists of configured hosts in a “docker_hosts” group or equivalent, so that you could use the docker module to add more to them?)

Thanks!!