community.docker.docker_container_exec module – Execute command in a docker container

Note

This module is part of the community.docker collection (version 4.8.1).

You might already have this collection installed if you are using the ansible package. It is not included in ansible-core. To check whether it is installed, run ansible-galaxy collection list.

To install it, use: ansible-galaxy collection install community.docker. You need further requirements to be able to use this module, see Requirements for details.

To use it in a playbook, specify: community.docker.docker_container_exec.

New in community.docker 1.5.0

Synopsis 

Executes a command in a Docker container.

Requirements 

The below requirements are needed on the host that executes this module.

Docker API >= 1.25
backports.ssl_match_hostname (when using TLS on Python 2)
paramiko (when using SSH with use_ssh_client=false)
pyOpenSSL (when using TLS)
pywin32 (when using named pipes on Windows 32)
requests

Parameters 

Parameter	Comments
api_version aliases: docker_api_version string	The version of the Docker API running on the Docker Host. Defaults to the latest version of the API supported by this collection and the docker daemon. If the value is not specified in the task, the value of environment variable `DOCKER_API_VERSION` will be used instead. If the environment variable is not set, the default value will be used. Default: `"auto"`
argv list / elements=string	The command to execute. Since this is a list of arguments, no quoting is needed. Exactly one of `argv` or `command` must be specified.
ca_path aliases: ca_cert, tls_ca_cert, cacert_path path	Use a CA certificate when performing server verification by providing the path to a CA certificate file. If the value is not specified in the task and the environment variable `DOCKER_CERT_PATH` is set, the file `ca.pem` from the directory specified in the environment variable `DOCKER_CERT_PATH` will be used. This option was called `ca_cert` and got renamed to `ca_path` in community.docker 3.6.0. The old name has been added as an alias and can still be used.
chdir string	The directory to run the command in.
client_cert aliases: tls_client_cert, cert_path path	Path to the client’s TLS certificate file. If the value is not specified in the task and the environment variable `DOCKER_CERT_PATH` is set, the file `cert.pem` from the directory specified in the environment variable `DOCKER_CERT_PATH` will be used.
client_key aliases: tls_client_key, key_path path	Path to the client’s TLS key file. If the value is not specified in the task and the environment variable `DOCKER_CERT_PATH` is set, the file `key.pem` from the directory specified in the environment variable `DOCKER_CERT_PATH` will be used.
command string	The command to execute. Exactly one of `argv` or `command` must be specified.
container string / required	The name of the container to execute the command in.
debug boolean	Debug mode Choices: `false` ← (default) `true`
detach boolean added in community.docker 2.1.0	Whether to run the command synchronously (`detach=false`, default) or asynchronously (`detach=true`). If set to `true`, `stdin` cannot be provided, and the return values `stdout`, `stderr`, and `rc` are not returned. Choices: `false` ← (default) `true`
docker_host aliases: docker_url string	The URL or Unix socket path used to connect to the Docker API. To connect to a remote host, provide the TCP connection string. For example, `tcp://192.0.2.23:2376`. If TLS is used to encrypt the connection, the module will automatically replace `tcp` in the connection URL with `https`. If the value is not specified in the task, the value of environment variable `DOCKER_HOST` will be used instead. If the environment variable is not set, the default value will be used. Default: `"unix:///var/run/docker.sock"`
env dictionary added in community.docker 2.1.0	Dictionary of environment variables with their respective values to be passed to the command ran inside the container. Values which might be parsed as numbers, booleans or other types by the YAML parser must be quoted (for example `"true"`) in order to avoid data loss. Please note that if you are passing values in with Jinja2 templates, like `"{{ value }}"`, you need to add `\| string` to prevent Ansible to convert strings such as `"true"` back to booleans. The correct way is to use `"{{ value \| string }}"`.
stdin string	Set the stdin of the command directly to the specified value. Can only be used if `detach=false`.
stdin_add_newline boolean	If set to `true`, appends a newline to `stdin`. Choices: `false` `true` ← (default)
strip_empty_ends boolean	Strip empty lines from the end of stdout/stderr in result. Choices: `false` `true` ← (default)
timeout integer	The maximum amount of time in seconds to wait on a response from the API. If the value is not specified in the task, the value of environment variable `DOCKER_TIMEOUT` will be used instead. If the environment variable is not set, the default value will be used. Default: `60`
tls boolean	Secure the connection to the API by using TLS without verifying the authenticity of the Docker host server. Note that if `validate_certs` is set to `true` as well, it will take precedence. If the value is not specified in the task, the value of environment variable `DOCKER_TLS` will be used instead. If the environment variable is not set, the default value will be used. Choices: `false` ← (default) `true`
tls_hostname string	When verifying the authenticity of the Docker Host server, provide the expected name of the server. If the value is not specified in the task, the value of environment variable `DOCKER_TLS_HOSTNAME` will be used instead. If the environment variable is not set, the default value will be used. Note that this option had a default value `localhost` in older versions. It was removed in community.docker 3.0.0.
tty boolean	Whether to allocate a TTY. Choices: `false` ← (default) `true`
use_ssh_client boolean added in community.docker 1.5.0	For SSH transports, use the `ssh` CLI tool instead of paramiko. Choices: `false` ← (default) `true`
user string	If specified, the user to execute this command with.
validate_certs aliases: tls_verify boolean	Secure the connection to the API by using TLS and verifying the authenticity of the Docker host server. If the value is not specified in the task, the value of environment variable `DOCKER_TLS_VERIFY` will be used instead. If the environment variable is not set, the default value will be used. Choices: `false` ← (default) `true`

Attributes 

Attribute	Support	Description
action_group	Action groups: community.docker.docker, docker	Use `group/docker` or `group/community.docker.docker` in `module_defaults` to set defaults for this module.
check_mode	Support: none	Can run in `check_mode` and return changed status prediction without modifying target.
diff_mode	Support: none	Will return details on what has changed (or possibly needs changing in `check_mode`), when in diff mode.
idempotent	Support: N/A Whether the executed command is idempotent depends on the command.	When run twice in a row outside check mode, with the same arguments, the second invocation indicates no change. This assumes that the system controlled/queried by the module has not changed in a relevant way.

Notes 

Note

Does not work with TCP TLS sockets when using stdin. This is caused by the inability to send close_notify without closing the connection with Python’s SSLSockets. See https://github.com/ansible-collections/community.docker/issues/605 for more information.
If you need to evaluate environment variables of the container in command or argv, you need to pass the command through a shell, like command=/bin/sh -c "echo $ENV_VARIABLE". The same needs to be done in case you want to use glob patterns or other shell features such as redirects.
Connect to the Docker daemon by providing parameters with each task or by defining environment variables. You can define DOCKER_HOST, DOCKER_TLS_HOSTNAME, DOCKER_API_VERSION, DOCKER_CERT_PATH, DOCKER_TLS, DOCKER_TLS_VERIFY and DOCKER_TIMEOUT. If you are using docker machine, run the script shipped with the product that sets up the environment. It will set these variables for you. See https://docs.docker.com/machine/reference/env/ for more details.
This module does not use the Docker SDK for Python to communicate with the Docker daemon. It uses code derived from the Docker SDK or Python that is included in this collection.

Examples 

---
- name: Run a simple command (command)
  community.docker.docker_container_exec:
    container: foo
    command: /bin/bash -c "ls -lah"
    chdir: /root
  register: result

- name: Print stdout
  ansible.builtin.debug:
    var: result.stdout

- name: Run a simple command (argv)
  community.docker.docker_container_exec:
    container: foo
    argv:
      - /bin/bash
      - "-c"
      - "ls -lah > /dev/stderr"
    chdir: /root
  register: result

- name: Print stderr lines
  ansible.builtin.debug:
    var: result.stderr_lines

Return Values 

Common return values are documented here, the following are the fields unique to this module:

Key	Description
exec_id string added in community.docker 2.1.0	The execution ID of the command. Returned: success and `detach=true` Sample: `"249d9e3075655baf705ed8f40488c5e9434049cf3431976f1bfdb73741c574c5"`
rc integer	The exit code of the command. Returned: success and `detach=false` Sample: `0`
stderr string	The standard error output of the container command. Returned: success and `detach=false`
stdout string	The standard output of the container command. Returned: success and `detach=false`

Authors

Felix Fontein (@felixfontein)

community.docker.docker_container_exec module – Execute command in a docker container

Synopsis

Requirements

Parameters

Attributes

Notes

Examples

Return Values