# Improved ways to store host and group variables **URL:** \ **Category:** Ansible Project\ **Created:** [July 21, 2012, 12:12pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/improved-ways-to-store-host-and-group-variables/11710 "2012-07-21T12:12:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Michael\_DeHaan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@Michael\_DeHaan](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Michael_DeHaan)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 12:12pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/improved-ways-to-store-host-and-group-variables/11710/1 "2012-07-21T12:12:02Z")
New minor feature. I really wanted to be able to store structured group and host variables separate from my inventory. Assume your inventory file is /etc/ansible/hosts and looks like this: ===== START ===== [webservers] pinky brain [dbservers] pinky snowball ===== STOP ===== With this new feature, for the host Pinky, ansible will load variables from these places, in order:     /etc/ansible/group\_vars/webservers     /etc/ansible/group\_vars/dbservers     /etc/ansible/host\_vars/pinky If these files don't exist, nothing happens. If your host file was in a different location, the path would still be relative to that file, so it still works for non-root/checkout users (This is also, incidentally, how I'm going to enable removal of the YAML inventory format. We'll auto-convert any variables stored into an inventory file into this structure.) So yeah, with this, you can totally happily use the INI file format to describe your hosts and groups -- because it's a lot simpler -- and then if you need for store a hash or a list or something in a group or host variable, you have a very easy way to do that. Will include this in the docs section when 0.6 rolls out, but it's available on the development branch now. --Michael ---
**Author:** ![jpmens1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jpmens1](https://forum.ansible.com/u/jpmens1)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 12:47pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/improved-ways-to-store-host-and-group-variables/11710/2 "2012-07-21T12:47:38Z")
> With this new feature, for the host Pinky, ansible will load variables from these places, in order: > >     /etc/ansible/group\_vars/webservers >     /etc/ansible/group\_vars/dbservers >     /etc/ansible/host\_vars/pinky Way cool!         -JP ---
**Author:** ![John\_Callender](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b5ac83/32.png) [@John\_Callender](https://forum.ansible.com/u/John_Callender)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 5:04pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/improved-ways-to-store-host-and-group-variables/11710/3 "2012-07-21T17:04:35Z")
What format are the group\_vars/\* and host\_vars/\* files in? Are those YAML? ---
**Author:** ![Michael\_DeHaan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@Michael\_DeHaan](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Michael_DeHaan)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 5:40pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/improved-ways-to-store-host-and-group-variables/11710/4 "2012-07-21T17:40:03Z")
Yep. ---
**Author:** ![CWS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e495f1/32.png) [@CWS](https://forum.ansible.com/u/CWS)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 7:35am UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/improved-ways-to-store-host-and-group-variables/11710/5 "2012-07-22T07:35:37Z")
Hmm. With a hosts file like this: ---
**Author:** ![CWS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e495f1/32.png) [@CWS](https://forum.ansible.com/u/CWS)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 7:57am UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/improved-ways-to-store-host-and-group-variables/11710/6 "2012-07-22T07:57:56Z")
PS: Removing the ‘if’ condition in playbook/ **init**.py has the group\_vars file working as expected for task actions (bar untested side effects), but the variables are not used in the task names. If I change the playbook to