sysctl.conf

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1

Hello,
Is there a way to create a backup of /etc/sysctl.conf when making a change using the sysctl core module? If not can this feature be added?

Thanks

2

In general, ansible modules do not perform backups of files that they
modify. I'm not sure that sysctl is especially special in this
regard. Is there a reason you need this for sysctl but not for copy,
or any of the other modules?

-Toshio

3

I was thinking an implementation along the lines of the “lineinfile” module where you can edit a file and create a backup at the same time. For the sysctl module if you have to edit a sysctl.conf file then a backup seems like a good failsafe.

4

Yeah, I just noticed that backup actually does exist on a lot of the
file-like modules. I just hadn't noticed them before. So yeah,
adding a backup parameter that does the same thing for sysctl seems
like a good idea. Could you open a pull request if you can code it or
an issue if you can't so that hte idea doesn't get lost?

Thanks,
-Toshio

5

Sure, I’ll work on the pull request.

6

Let’s not add a new backup parameter.

The existing backup=yes/no parameter that only creates local backups needs to be overhauled to do remotes, and we can generalize it at this time.

7

In which release would the overall be completed?

Thanks

8

Honestly, no idea.

We need to get the v2 refactoring out in 1.9 (worst case 2.0) first, and then we’ll be in a good position to make a generalized backup mechanism.

Until then, something like a “fetch” module call to manually do it would be a good solution.

9

I dont know if fetch itself will work for me. All i want to do is create a backup of a file on the client before i edit it using sysctl.
I guess i could try a fetch first and then a copy back to the destination.

For the overall are you going to add a backup option every time a file gets modified (file modules, sysctl moudles, etc.) ?

Thanks