Results of survey on various style questions

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Hi,

following CfgMgmtCamp 2026 conference and a presentation of various questions related to Ansible style:

Ansible Style Guide,presentation

Page of this talk on CfgMgmtCamp website

Survey, question on certain questions of code style for Ansible

Survey in Ansible forum

As of February 2026 around 20 people answered each of the questions; both by people actively contributing to Ansible (core team members, maintainers, etc.) and by Ansible users.

Results

Questions with answers on which (almost) everyone agrees on

  1. Are the quotes necessary for all strings?

Community answer: no, it is not necessary to quote all strings

So below is just fine:

apache_package_name: httpd

  1. What is the preferred option when it comes to “external” quotes?

Community answer: Double quotes (")

  1. What is the preferred notation for lists and dictionaries?
    Community answer: Block-style notation over flow-style

Block-style:

Example of a list:
tags: 
  - install
  - configure

Example of a dictionary:
user: 
  name: Alice
  age: 30

instead of

tags: [install,configure]
...
user: {name: Alice, age: 30}

Questions where overwhelming majority has chosen one option over ther other

  1. What is preferred inventory format?

Community answer: YAML

  1. What are the verb(s) that should be used within a task name, “Install, create, configure” or “Ensure”

Community answer: Prefer Install, Create, Configure, etc. etc. in task names over Ensure

Questions where majority chooses one option over the other one but it is (almost) a tie

  1. Is it good practice to prefix internal variables with double undescores (__) and/or use r_ prefix for variables used in register task attribute?

Community answer: no, it is not necessary

  1. What is the preferred dictionary notation?

Community answer: Dot notation is preferred over bracket notation for dictionaries

{{ my_dictionary.mykey }} over {{ my_dictionary['mykey'] }}

Other notes:

  • meta/main.yml file inside of Ansible roles is used and maintained by people in Ansible community

  • meta/argument_specs.yml file inside of Ansible roles is used and maintained by people in Ansible community

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