Get community.general.make task idempotent

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1

Currently I try to install the GIMP plugin BIMP via Ansible. So the tasks I want to execute are:

Now I found the community.general.make module. And yes, I could install the plugin with the help of this module. Unfortunately, every time I start the playbook again, it executes the make and make install tasks again.
My understanding for getting the tasks idempotent is to use either creates or a when clause. But both are not allowed with the community.general.make module. So how can I achieve the idempotency?

Here a snipet from my playbook:

    - name: Clone the BIMP repository
      ansible.builtin.git:
        repo: https://github.com/alessandrofrancesconi/gimp-plugin-bimp.git
        dest: /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp
        clone: yes
        update: yes

    - name: Build the BIMP target
      community.general.make:
        chdir: /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp

    - name: Run BIMP 'install' target
      community.general.make:
        chdir: /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp
        target: install
2

You could just run the tasks when the git clone changes anything?

    - name: Clone the BIMP repository
      ansible.builtin.git:
        repo: https://github.com/alessandrofrancesconi/gimp-plugin-bimp.git
        dest: /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp
        clone: true
        update: true
      register: bimp_git_clone

    - name: Build and install BIMP when git clone results change
      block:

        - name: Build the BIMP target
          community.general.make:
            chdir: /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp

        - name: Run BIMP 'install' target
          community.general.make:
            chdir: /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp
            target: install

      when: bimp_git_clone.changed | bool

If you also specified a version for the git clone then it would be more idempotent?

3

The git clone copies the repo for the first run. For the next runs, Ansible says ok. The make command generates a file that I could specify with

creates: /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp/bin/bimp

but creates is not available in the community.general.make module.

4

You could do something like this — only run make and make install if the git clone changes anything or if the /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp/bin/bimp files doesn’t exist?

    - name: Clone the BIMP repository
      ansible.builtin.git:
        repo: https://github.com/alessandrofrancesconi/gimp-plugin-bimp.git
        dest: /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp
        clone: true
        update: true
      register: bimp_git_clone

    - name: Stat /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp/bin/bimp
      ansible.builtin.stat:
        path: /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp/bin/bimp
      register: bimp_bin_bimp
  
    - name: Build and install BIMP when git clone results change or bin/bimp doesn't exist
      block:
  
        - name: Build the BIMP target
          community.general.make:
            chdir: /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp
  
        - name: Run BIMP 'install' target
          community.general.make:
            chdir: /opt/gimp-plugin-bimp
            target: install
  
      when: ( bimp_git_clone.changed | bool ) or ( not bimp_bin_bimp.stat.exists | bool )
5

@chris: Thanks for this hint. Unfortunately that does not work. Ansible throws the following exception:

fatal: [xxxxxxx]: FAILED! => {}

MSG:

The conditional check '( bimp_git_clone.changed | bool ) or ( not bimp_bin_bimp.exists | bool )' failed. The error was: error while evaluating conditional (( bimp_git_clone.changed | bool ) or ( not bimp_bin_bimp.exists | bool )): 'dict object' has no attribute 'exists'. 'dict object' has no attribute 'exists'

The error appears to be in '/media/web/projects/common/ansible/runner/project/set_RaspiHOME_example.yml': line 39, column 11, but may
be elsewhere in the file depending on the exact syntax problem.

The offending line appears to be:


        - name: Build the BIMP target
          ^ here

Still I think it would be helpful to allow creates in the module.

6

Sorry I made a typo, bimp_bin_bimp.exists should have been bimp_bin_bimp.stat.exists, I have corrected it above.

Open an issue for this in the repo if there isn’t one already?

7

@chris: Thanks very much, now it works fine.
Before opening an issue, I wanted to make sure that I understand the matter correctly.

1 Like
8

Now I created a feature request:
Add creates and when to community.general.make #9732

1 Like
9

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