# Would It Make Sense to Allow Multiple Inventories? **URL:** \ **Category:** Ansible Project\ **Created:** [February 4, 2017, 6:55pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640 "2017-02-04T18:55:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Jon\_Forrest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a698b9/32.png) [@Jon\_Forrest](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Jon_Forrest)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2017, 6:55pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640/1 "2017-02-04T18:55:05Z")
The Ansible documentation says "you can also use multiple inventory files at the same time" but, AFAIK, that isn't entirely accurate. If you give the '-i' flag a directory, then any inventory files under that directory are indeed used, which is nice. However, what if you want to use several inventory files that are \*not\* under a specific parent directory? For example, maybe you want to use /etc/ansible/hosts and ~/ansible/my\_inventory. From what I can see, this isn't currently possible. Is this correct? I would think it would be nice if the '-i' option were changed to accept multiple directories. I know you can currently give multiple comma-separated hosts so maybe a different character would be used to separate directories. What do you think? Cordially, Jon Forrest ---
**Author:** ![j.r.hawkesworth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a3d4f5/32.png) [@j.r.hawkesworth](https://forum.ansible.com/u/j.r.hawkesworth)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2017, 8:27am UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640/2 "2017-02-05T08:27:05Z")
I wonder if the issue you describe could be solved with a symlink? ---
**Author:** ![Jon\_Forrest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a698b9/32.png) [@Jon\_Forrest](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Jon_Forrest)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2017, 6:14pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640/3 "2017-02-05T18:14:27Z")
I don't think so. A symlink points to a single file (unlike logical names in good old VAX/VMS). So, it wouldn't be possible to use both a system inventory and a personal one. Jon Forrest ---
**Author:** ![j.r.hawkesworth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a3d4f5/32.png) [@j.r.hawkesworth](https://forum.ansible.com/u/j.r.hawkesworth)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2017, 7:26pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640/4 "2017-02-05T19:26:29Z")
Maybe if you made your user inventory a dir and then had a symlink in there to the shared inventory? I have remembered now that you can use an executable python script as a source of inventory, so you could read both user and shared inventory in that, which might be a cleaner alternative. ---
**Author:** ![Jon\_Forrest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a698b9/32.png) [@Jon\_Forrest](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Jon_Forrest)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2017, 9:01pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640/5 "2017-02-05T21:01:59Z")
> Maybe if you made your user inventory a dir and then had a symlink in > there to the shared inventory? I see what you mean. That might be a good workaround but it sure seems to me that expanding the '-i' option would be a better solution. > I have remembered now that you can use an executable python script as > a source of inventory, so you could read both user and shared > inventory in that, which might be a cleaner alternative. Again, that sounds like a fine workaround but there should be a clean and simple way of doing this. Jon ---
**Author:** ![Brian\_Coca](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6de8d8/32.png) [@Brian\_Coca](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Brian_Coca)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 2:18pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640/6 "2017-02-06T14:18:38Z")
I've thought about expanding the -i option to work as you ask, it shouldn't be too hard. ---
**Author:** ![Ted\_Zlatanov](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d2c977/32.png) [@Ted\_Zlatanov](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Ted_Zlatanov)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 2:23pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640/7 "2017-02-06T14:23:13Z")
Simply accepting multiple `-i` options would be enough, no need for special characters. In addition, inventory locations could be URLs in addition to file locations. That would decouple the inventory so it can be easily distributed to new machines etc. Obviously the inventory script could download a URL, but that still requires a local executable to be created and maintained. Ted ---
**Author:** ![Jon\_Forrest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a698b9/32.png) [@Jon\_Forrest](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Jon_Forrest)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 3:25pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640/8 "2017-02-06T15:25:01Z")
Maybe I'll give it a try. The only thing I can think of that might be a problem is distinguishing arguments that are hostnames from those that are inventory files. In a way it's too bad that hostnames are allowed in a '-i' argument. Jon ---
**Author:** ![Brian\_Coca](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6de8d8/32.png) [@Brian\_Coca](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Brian_Coca)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2017, 3:42pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640/9 "2017-02-06T15:42:12Z")
the distinction is easy, hostnames are only allowed when there is a , . so if the string after -i does not have a comma, its a path. ---
**Author:** ![Jon\_Forrest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a698b9/32.png) [@Jon\_Forrest](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Jon_Forrest)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2017, 5:40am UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640/10 "2017-02-07T05:40:04Z")
I'm not so sure. The help for '-i' says "specify inventory host path (default=/etc/ansible/hosts) or comma separated host list." How would it be possible to distinguish a comma separated host list from a comma separated inventory host path list? For example, would -i a,b,c be the hosts "a", "b", and "c", or the files (or directories) "a", "b", and "c"? A very quick glance at inventory/\_\_main\_\_.py(parse\_inventory) makes me think that the elements of the string are first checked to see if they're a host, and then checked to see if they're a directory or file. The presence of a comma in itself isn't enough to differentiate paths an host. Of course, I just started reading Ansible source so I'm not 100% sure I have this right. I was thinking that maybe requiring that host paths contain slash characters, as part of either an absolute or relative path, would work. Or maybe saying if the string argument to "-i" ends in a comma, then the whole string would be considered a host list, but if it ends in anything other than a comma, it would be a inventory host path list. Anyway, thanks for your input. Jon ---
**Author:** ![Brian\_Coca](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6de8d8/32.png) [@Brian\_Coca](https://forum.ansible.com/u/Brian_Coca)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2017, 11:04pm UTC](https://forum.ansible.com/t/would-it-make-sense-to-allow-multiple-inventories/23640/11 "2017-02-09T23:04:36Z")
We do not support comma separated host paths, adding multiple paths can be done by allowing multiple -i ansible -i ./myhosts -i /etc/ansible/hosts