Not working together - connection: local and delegate_to

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1

Hi Team,

Good Day!! Am not able to use Connection: local and Delegate_to together in my playbooks.

Actual Result - Both debug outputs give me the same hostname.
Expected Result: First debug should have given me the localhost hostname and second debug should have given me the “pocansibletest” as per the playbook. But doesnt work as expected.

Playbook:

  • hosts: pocansibletest
    connection: local
    become: false
    remote_user: admin
    tasks:

  • name: Set VM_Name as fact
    set_fact:
    vm_name: “{{ inventory_hostname }}”

  • name: Test host name without delegation
    shell: hostname
    register: name_without_del

  • name: Debug host name without delegation
    debug:
    msg: “Debug host name without delegation - {{ name_without_del.stdout }}”

  • name: Test host name with delegation
    delegate_to: “{{vm_name}}”
    shell: hostname
    register: name_with_del

  • name: Debug host name with delegation
    debug:
    msg: “Debug host name with delegation - {{ name_with_del.stdout }}”

Thanks & Regards,
Vichu

2

Below is the ansible version am using and giving out issue

ansible [core 2.13.4]
config file = /etc/ansible/ansible.cfg
configured module search path = [‘/home/rundeck/.ansible/plugins/modules’, ‘/usr/share/ansible/plugins/modules’]
ansible python module location = /usr/local/lib/python3.8/dist-packages/ansible
ansible collection location = /home/rundeck/.ansible/collections:/usr/share/ansible/collections
executable location = /usr/local/bin/ansible
python version = 3.8.10 (default, Jun 22 2022, 20:18:18) [GCC 9.4.0]
jinja version = 3.1.2
libyaml = True

Also to confirm the playbook gives appropriate hostnames on ansible v2.7
ansible 2.7.18.post0
config file = /etc/ansible/ansible.cfg
configured module search path = [u’/root/.ansible/plugins/modules’, u’/usr/share/ansible/plugins/modules’]
ansible python module location = /usr/lib/python2.7/site-packages/ansible
executable location = /usr/bin/ansible
python version = 2.7.5 (default, Nov 16 2020, 22:23:17) [GCC 4.8.5 20150623 (Red Hat 4.8.5-44)]

Thanks & Regards,
Vichu

3
  • hosts: pocansibletest

This absolutely IS your inventory host. delegate_to and connection: local only tell ansible where to run. They do not affect the “inventory”.

Walter

4

Yes your are right but the below task does not give the hostname of “pocansibletest” and gives the hostname of the localhost itself in ansible v6. But the same works perfectly on ansible v2.7 without any changes to playbook.

  • name: Test host name with delegation
    delegate_to: “{{vm_name}}”
    shell: hostname
    register: name_with_del

The requirement for me is to run many tasks on localhost and delegate some tasks to remote hosts using delegate_to directive. But with ansible v6 its always executing on localhost and I see inappropriate behaviour and failures.

5

You set_fact vm_name to inventory_hostname in the first task. This assigns “pocansibletest” to vm_name. If you then delegate_to vm_name you are delegating to “pocansibletest”.

The connection: local doesn’t factor into this. All tasks are still operating on the inventory “pocansibletest”.

Walter

6

Yes you are right, thats my understanding, but what output I get is the hostname where the ansible playbook has triggered. So its not working as expected with Ansible V6

7

Please provide the playbook AND the actual output from running the playbook so we can see which task produces which output.

Walter