How to pass additional environment variables to the imported ansible playbook - ansible

Question

I have a main_play.yml Ansible playbook in which I am importing a reusable playbook a.yml.
main_play.yml
- import_playbook: "reusable_playbooks/a.yml"
a.yml
---
- name: my_playbook
hosts: "{{ HOSTS }}"
force_handlers: true
gather_facts: false
environment:
APP_DEFAULT_PORT: "{{ APP_DEFAULT_PORT }}"
tasks:
- name: Print Msg
debug:
msg: "hello"
My question is: how can I pass an additional environment variable from my main_playbook.yml playbook to my re-usable playbook a.yml (if needed) so that the environment variables become like
environment:
APP_DEFAULT_PORT: "{{ APP_DEFAULT_PORT }}"
SPRING_PROFILE: "{{ SPRING_PROFILE }}"

Answer 1

import_playbook is not really a module but a core feature. It does not allow for any parameter to be passed to the imported playbook. You can see this keyword as a simple commodity to facilitate playing several playbooks in a row exactly as if they were defined in the same file.
So your problem comes down to:
How do I pass additional environment variables to a play ?
Here is one solution with illustrations to use it with extra_vars or setting a fact from a previous play. This far from being exhaustive but I hope it will guide you to you own best solution.
To ease readability:
I used the APP_ prefix for all environment variables in my below examples and filtered only on those for the results.
I truncated the playbook output to the only relevant debug task
We can define the following reusable.yml playbook containing a single play
---
- hosts: localhost
gather_facts: false
vars:
default_env:
APP_DEFAULT_PORT: "{{ APP_DEFAULT_PORT | d(8080) }}"
environment: "{{ default_env | combine(additionnal_env | d({})) }}"
tasks:
- name: get the output on env for APP_* vars
shell: env | grep -i app_
register: env_cmd
changed_when: false
- name: debug the output of env
debug:
var: env_cmd.stdout_lines
We can directly run this playbook as-is which will give
$ ansible-playbook reusable.yml
[... truncated ...]
TASK [debug the output of env] ************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [localhost] => {
"env_cmd.stdout_lines": [
"APP_DEFAULT_PORT=8080"
]
}
We can override the default port with
$ ansible-playbook reusable.yml -e APP_DEFAULT_PORT=1234
[... truncated ...]
TASK [debug the output of env] ************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [localhost] => {
"env_cmd.stdout_lines": [
"APP_DEFAULT_PORT=1234"
]
}
We can pass additional environment variables with:
$ ansible-playbook reusable.yml -e '{"additionnal_env":{"APP_SPRING_PROFILE": "/toto/pipo"}}'
[... truncated ...]
TASK [debug the output of env] ************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [localhost] => {
"env_cmd.stdout_lines": [
"APP_SPRING_PROFILE=/toto/pipo",
"APP_DEFAULT_PORT=8080"
]
}
Now if we want to do this from a parent playbook, we can set the needed variable for the given host in a previous play. We can define a parent.yml playbook:
---
- hosts: localhost
gather_facts: false
tasks:
- name: define additionnal env vars for this host to be used in next play(s)
set_fact:
additionnal_env:
APP_WHATEVER: some_value
APP_VERY_IMPORTANT: "ho yes!"
- import_playbook: reusable.yml
which will give:
$ ansible-playbook parent.yml
[... truncated ...]
TASK [define additionnal env vars for this host to be used in next play(s)] ************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [localhost]
[... truncated ...]
TASK [debug the output of env] ************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [localhost] => {
"env_cmd.stdout_lines": [
"APP_WHATEVER=some_value",
"APP_VERY_IMPORTANT=ho yes!",
"APP_DEFAULT_PORT=8080"
]
}