blockinfile - Insert/update/remove a text block surrounded by marker lines.

New in version 2.0.

Synopsis
Options
Examples
Notes
This is an Extras Module

Synopsis

This module will insert/update/remove a block of multi-line text surrounded by customizable marker lines.

Options

parameter	required	default	choices	comments
backup	no	no	yes no	Create a backup file including the timestamp information so you can get the original file back if you somehow clobbered it incorrectly.
block	no			The text to insert inside the marker lines. If it's missing or an empty string, the block will be removed as if `state` were specified to `absent`. aliases: content
create	no	no	yes no	Create a new file if it doesn't exist.
dest	yes			The file to modify. aliases: name, destfile
follow (added in 2.1)	no	no	yes no	This flag indicates that filesystem links, if they exist, should be followed.
group	no			name of the group that should own the file/directory, as would be fed to chown
insertafter	no	EOF	EOF regex	If specified, the block will be inserted after the last match of specified regular expression. A special value is available; `EOF` for inserting the block at the end of the file. If specified regular expresion has no matches, `EOF` will be used instead.
insertbefore	no	None	BOF regex	If specified, the block will be inserted before the last match of specified regular expression. A special value is available; `BOF` for inserting the block at the beginning of the file. If specified regular expresion has no matches, the block will be inserted at the end of the file.
marker	no	# {mark} ANSIBLE MANAGED BLOCK		The marker line template. "{mark}" will be replaced with "BEGIN" or "END".
mode	no			mode the file or directory should be. For those used to /usr/bin/chmod remember that modes are actually octal numbers (like 0644). Leaving off the leading zero will likely have unexpected results. As of version 1.8, the mode may be specified as a symbolic mode (for example, `u+rwx` or `u=rw,g=r,o=r`).
owner	no			name of the user that should own the file/directory, as would be fed to chown
selevel	no	s0		level part of the SELinux file context. This is the MLS/MCS attribute, sometimes known as the `range`. `_default` feature works as for seuser.
serole	no			role part of SELinux file context, `_default` feature works as for seuser.
setype	no			type part of SELinux file context, `_default` feature works as for seuser.
seuser	no			user part of SELinux file context. Will default to system policy, if applicable. If set to `_default`, it will use the `user` portion of the policy if available
state	no	present	present absent	Whether the block should be there or not.
validate	no	None		The validation command to run before copying into place. The path to the file to validate is passed in via '%s' which must be present as in the example below. The command is passed securely so shell features like expansion and pipes won't work.

Examples

- name: insert/update "Match User" configuation block in /etc/ssh/sshd_config
  blockinfile:
    dest: /etc/ssh/sshd_config
    block: |
      Match User ansible-agent
      PasswordAuthentication no

- name: insert/update eth0 configuration stanza in /etc/network/interfaces
        (it might be better to copy files into /etc/network/interfaces.d/)
  blockinfile:
    dest: /etc/network/interfaces
    block: |
      iface eth0 inet static
          address 192.168.0.1
          netmask 255.255.255.0

- name: insert/update HTML surrounded by custom markers after <body> line
  blockinfile:
    dest: /var/www/html/index.html
    marker: "<!-- {mark} ANSIBLE MANAGED BLOCK -->"
    insertafter: "<body>"
    content: |
      <h1>Welcome to {{ansible_hostname}}</h1>
      <p>Last updated on {{ansible_date_time.iso8601}}</p>

- name: remove HTML as well as surrounding markers
  blockinfile:
    dest: /var/www/html/index.html
    marker: "<!-- {mark} ANSIBLE MANAGED BLOCK -->"
    content: ""

- name: insert/update "Match User" configuation block in /etc/ssh/sshd_config
  blockinfile:
    dest: /etc/hosts
    block: |
      {{item.name}} {{item.ip}}
    marker: "# {mark} ANSIBLE MANAGED BLOCK {{item.name}}"
  with_items:
      - { name: host1, ip: 10.10.1.10 }
      - { name: host2, ip: 10.10.1.11 }
      - { name: host3, ip: 10.10.1.12 }

Notes

Note

This module supports check mode.

Note

When using ‘with_*’ loops be aware that if you do not set a unique mark the block will be overwritten on each iteration.

This is an Extras Module

For more information on what this means please read Extras Modules

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