google.cloud.gcp_compute inventory – Google Cloud Compute Engine inventory source

Note

This inventory plugin is part of the google.cloud collection (version 1.0.2).

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 google.cloud.

To use it in a playbook, specify: google.cloud.gcp_compute.

Synopsis

  • Get inventory hosts from Google Cloud Platform GCE.

  • Uses a YAML configuration file that ends with gcp_compute.(yml|yaml) or gcp.(yml|yaml).

Requirements

The below requirements are needed on the local controller node that executes this inventory.

  • requests >= 2.18.4

  • google-auth >= 1.3.0

Parameters

Parameter

Comments

auth_kind

string / required

The type of credential used.

Choices:

  • application

  • serviceaccount

  • machineaccount

Configuration:

  • Environment variable: GCP_AUTH_KIND

    added in 2.8.2 of google.cloud

cache

boolean

Toggle to enable/disable the caching of the inventory’s source data, requires a cache plugin setup to work.

Choices:

  • no ← (default)

  • yes

Configuration:

  • INI entry:

    [inventory]
    cache = no
    
  • Environment variable: ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_CACHE

cache_connection

string

Cache connection data or path, read cache plugin documentation for specifics.

Configuration:

  • INI entries:

    [defaults]
    fact_caching_connection = None
    
    [inventory]
    cache_connection = None
    
  • Environment variable: ANSIBLE_CACHE_PLUGIN_CONNECTION

  • Environment variable: ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_CACHE_CONNECTION

cache_plugin

string

Cache plugin to use for the inventory’s source data.

Default: “memory”

Configuration:

  • INI entries:

    [defaults]
    fact_caching = memory
    
    [inventory]
    cache_plugin = memory
    
  • Environment variable: ANSIBLE_CACHE_PLUGIN

  • Environment variable: ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_CACHE_PLUGIN

cache_prefix

string

Prefix to use for cache plugin files/tables

Default: “ansible_inventory_”

Configuration:

  • INI entries:

    [default]
    fact_caching_prefix = ansible_inventory_
    

    Removed in: version 2.16 of ansible.builtin

    Why: Fixes typing error in INI section name

    Alternative: Use the ‘defaults’ section instead

    [defaults]
    fact_caching_prefix = ansible_inventory_
    
    [inventory]
    cache_prefix = ansible_inventory_
    
  • Environment variable: ANSIBLE_CACHE_PLUGIN_PREFIX

  • Environment variable: ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_CACHE_PLUGIN_PREFIX

cache_timeout

integer

Cache duration in seconds

Default: 3600

Configuration:

  • INI entries:

    [defaults]
    fact_caching_timeout = 3600
    
    [inventory]
    cache_timeout = 3600
    
  • Environment variable: ANSIBLE_CACHE_PLUGIN_TIMEOUT

  • Environment variable: ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_CACHE_TIMEOUT

compose

dictionary

Create vars from jinja2 expressions.

Default: {}

filters

list / elements=string

A list of filter value pairs. Available filters are listed here https://cloud.google.com/compute/docs/reference/rest/v1/instances/aggregatedList. Each additional filter in the list will act be added as an AND condition (filter1 and filter2)

folders

list / elements=string

A folder that contains many projects

groups

dictionary

Add hosts to group based on Jinja2 conditionals.

Default: {}

hostnames

list / elements=string

A list of options that describe the ordering for which hostnames should be assigned. Currently supported hostnames are ‘public_ip’, ‘private_ip’, or ‘name’.

Default: [“public_ip”, “private_ip”, “name”]

keyed_groups

list / elements=dictionary

Add hosts to group based on the values of a variable.

Default: []

default_value

string

added in 2.12 of ansible.builtin

The default value when the host variable’s value is an empty string.

This option is mutually exclusive with trailing_separator.

key

string

The key from input dictionary used to generate groups

parent_group

string

parent group for keyed group

prefix

string

A keyed group name will start with this prefix

Default: “”

separator

string

separator used to build the keyed group name

Default: “_”

trailing_separator

boolean

added in 2.12 of ansible.builtin

Set this option to False to omit the separator after the host variable when the value is an empty string.

This option is mutually exclusive with default_value.

Choices:

  • no

  • yes ← (default)

leading_separator

boolean

added in 2.11 of ansible.builtin

Use in conjunction with keyed_groups.

By default, a keyed group that does not have a prefix or a separator provided will have a name that starts with an underscore.

This is because the default prefix is “” and the default separator is “_”.

Set this option to False to omit the leading underscore (or other separator) if no prefix is given.

If the group name is derived from a mapping the separator is still used to concatenate the items.

To not use a separator in the group name at all, set the separator for the keyed group to an empty string instead.

Choices:

  • no

  • yes ← (default)

plugin

string / required

token that ensures this is a source file for the ‘gcp_compute’ plugin.

Choices:

  • gcp_compute

projects

list / elements=string

A list of projects in which to describe GCE instances.

retrieve_image_info

boolean

added in 2.8 of google.cloud

Populate the image host fact for the instances returned with the GCP image name

By default this plugin does not attempt to resolve the boot image of an instance to the image name cataloged in GCP because of the performance overhead of the task.

Unless this option is enabled, the image host variable will be null

Choices:

  • no ← (default)

  • yes

scopes

list / elements=string

list of authentication scopes

Default: [“https://www.googleapis.com/auth/compute”]

Configuration:

  • Environment variable: GCP_SCOPES

    added in 2.8.2 of google.cloud

service_account_contents

string

added in 2.8.2 of google.cloud

A string representing the contents of a Service Account JSON file. This should not be passed in as a dictionary, but a string that has the exact contents of a service account json file (valid JSON).

Configuration:

  • Environment variable: GCP_SERVICE_ACCOUNT_CONTENTS

service_account_email

string

An optional service account email address if machineaccount is selected and the user does not wish to use the default email.

Configuration:

  • Environment variable: GCP_SERVICE_ACCOUNT_EMAIL

    added in 2.8.2 of google.cloud

service_account_file

path

The path of a Service Account JSON file if serviceaccount is selected as type.

Configuration:

  • Environment variable: GCP_SERVICE_ACCOUNT_FILE

    added in 2.8.2 of google.cloud

  • Environment variable: GCE_CREDENTIALS_FILE_PATH

    added in 2.8 of google.cloud

strict

boolean

If yes make invalid entries a fatal error, otherwise skip and continue.

Since it is possible to use facts in the expressions they might not always be available and we ignore those errors by default.

Choices:

  • no ← (default)

  • yes

use_contrib_script_compatible_sanitization

boolean

added in 2.8 of google.cloud

By default this plugin is using a general group name sanitization to create safe and usable group names for use in Ansible. This option allows you to override that, in efforts to allow migration from the old inventory script.

For this to work you should also turn off the TRANSFORM_INVALID_GROUP_CHARS setting, otherwise the core engine will just use the standard sanitization on top.

This is not the default as such names break certain functionality as not all characters are valid Python identifiers which group names end up being used as.

Choices:

  • no ← (default)

  • yes

use_extra_vars

boolean

added in 2.11 of ansible.builtin

Merge extra vars into the available variables for composition (highest precedence).

Choices:

  • no ← (default)

  • yes

Configuration:

  • INI entry:

    [inventory_plugins]
    use_extra_vars = no
    
  • Environment variable: ANSIBLE_INVENTORY_USE_EXTRA_VARS

vars_prefix

string

prefix to apply to host variables, does not include facts nor params

Default: “”

zones

list / elements=string

A list of regions in which to describe GCE instances. If none provided, it defaults to all zones available to a given project.

Examples

plugin: google.cloud.gcp_compute
zones: # populate inventory with instances in these regions
  - us-east1-a
projects:
  - gcp-prod-gke-100
  - gcp-cicd-101
filters:
  - machineType = n1-standard-1
  - scheduling.automaticRestart = true AND machineType = n1-standard-1
service_account_file: /tmp/service_account.json
auth_kind: serviceaccount
scopes:
 - 'https://www.googleapis.com/auth/cloud-platform'
 - 'https://www.googleapis.com/auth/compute.readonly'
keyed_groups:
  # Create groups from GCE labels
  - prefix: gcp
    key: labels
hostnames:
  # List host by name instead of the default public ip
  - name
compose:
  # Set an inventory parameter to use the Public IP address to connect to the host
  # For Private ip use "networkInterfaces[0].networkIP"
  ansible_host: networkInterfaces[0].accessConfigs[0].natIP

Hint

Configuration entries for each entry type have a low to high priority order. For example, a variable that is lower in the list will override a variable that is higher up.