Switching user for delegation to host outside of inventory with Ansible/awx - ansible

Question

I am trying to do the following using Ansible 2.8.4 and awx:
Read some facts from Cisco IOS devices (works)
Put results into a local file using a template (works)
Copy/Move the resulting file to a different server
Since I have to use a different user to access IOS devices and servers, and the servers in question aren't part of the inventory used for the playbook, I am trying to achieve this using become_user and delegate_to.
The initial user (defined in the awx template) is allowed to connect to the IOS devices, while different_user can connect to servers using a ssh private key.
The playbook:
---
- name: Read Switch Infos
hosts: all
gather_facts: no
tasks:
- name: Gather IOS Facts
ios_facts:
- debug: var=ansible_net_version
- name: Set Facts IOS
set_fact:
ios_version: "{{ ansible_net_version }}"
- name: Create Output file
file: path=/tmp/test state=directory mode=0755
delegate_to: 127.0.0.1
run_once: true
- name: Run Template
template:
src: ios_firmware_check.j2
dest: /tmp/test/output.txt
delegate_to: 127.0.0.1
run_once: true
- name: Set up keys
become: yes
become_method: su
become_user: different_user
authorized_key:
user: different_user
state: present
key: "{{ lookup('file', '/home/different_user/.ssh/key_file') }}"
delegate_to: 127.0.0.1
run_once: true
- name: Copy to remote server
remote_user: different_user
copy:
src: /tmp/test/output.txt
dest: /tmp/test/output.txt
delegate_to: remote.server.fqdn
run_once: true
When run, the playbook fails in the Set up keys task trying to access the home directory with the ssh key:
TASK [Set up keys] *************************************************************
task path: /tmp/awx_2206_mz90qvh9/project/IOS/ios_version.yml:23
[WARNING]: Unable to find '/home/different_user/.ssh/key_file' in expected paths
(use -vvvvv to see paths)
File lookup using None as file
fatal: [host]: FAILED! => {
"msg": "An unhandled exception occurred while running the lookup plugin 'file'. Error was a <class 'ansible.errors.AnsibleError'>, original message: could not locate file in lookup: /home/different_user/.ssh/key_file"
}
I'm assuming my mistake is somehow related to which user is trying to access the /home/ directory on which device.
Is there a better/more elegant/working way of connecting to a different server using an ssh key to move around files?
I know one possibility would be to just scp using the shell module, but that always feels a bit hacky.

Answer 1

(sort of) solved using encrypted variables in hostvars with Ansible vault.
How to get there:
Encrypting the passwords:
This needs to be done from any commandline with Ansible installed, for some reason this can't be done in tower/awx
ansible-vault encrypt_string "password"
You'll be prompted for a password to encrypt/decrypt.
If you're doing this for Cisco devices, you'll want to encrypt both the ssh and the enable password using this method.
Add encrypted passwords to inventory
For testing, I put it in hostvars for a single switch, should be fine to put it into groupvars and use it on multiple switches as well.
ansible_ssh_pass should be the password to access the switch, ansible_become_pass is the enable password.
---
all:
children:
Cisco:
children:
switches:
switches:
hosts:
HOSTNAME:
ansible_host: ip-address
ansible_user: username
ansible_ssh_pass: !vault |
$ANSIBLE_VAULT;1.1;AES256
[encrypted string]
ansible_connection: network_cli
ansible_network_os: ios
ansible_become: yes
ansible_become_method: enable
ansible_become_pass: !vault |
$ANSIBLE_VAULT;1.1;AES256
[encrypted string]
Adding the vault password to tower/awx
Add a new credential with credential type "Vault" and the password you used earlier to encrypt the strings.
Now, all you need to do is add the credential to your job template (the template can have one "normal" credential (machine, network, etc.) and multiple vaults).
The playbook then automagically accesses the vault credential to decrypt the strings in the inventory.
Playbook to get Switch Infos and drop template file on a server
The playbook now looks something like below, and does the following:
Gather Facts on all Switches in Inventory
Write all facts into a .csv using a template, save the file on the ansible host
Copy said file to a different server using a different user
The template is configured with the user able to access the server, the user used to access switches with a password is stored in the inventory as seen above.
---
- name: Read Switch Infos
hosts: all
gather_facts: no
tasks:
- name: Create Output file
file: path=/output/directory state=directory mode=0755
delegate_to: 127.0.0.1
run_once: true
- debug:
var: network
- name: Gather IOS Facts
remote_user: username
ios_facts:
- debug: var=ansible_net_version
- name: Set Facts IOS
set_fact:
ios_version: "{{ ansible_net_version }}"
- name: Run Template
template:
src: ios_firmware_check.csv.j2
dest: /output/directory/filename.csv
delegate_to: 127.0.0.1
run_once: true
- name: Create Destination folder on remote server outside inventory
remote_user: different_username
file: path=/destination/directory mode=0755
delegate_to: remote.server.fqdn
run_once: true
- name: Copy to remote server outside inventory
remote_user: different_username
copy:
src: /output/directory/filename.csv
dest: /destination/directory/filename.csv
delegate_to: remote.server.fqdn
run_once: true