Filter Ansible output from lineinfile - ansible

Question

I'm attempting to audit my systems via files copied to a single host. The default output is very verbose. I would like to see just the pertinent fields of Ansible log output; that way, over 1000 hosts, I can zero into my problems more quickly. . When my play is successful, I'd like to just see:
ok: u'/mnt/inventory/hostname999'
I have a playbook that looks like this:
- hosts: 'localhost'
name: Playbook for the Audit for our infrastructure.
gather_facts: False
become: no
connection: local
roles:
- { role: network, tags: network }
My network role main.xml file looks like this:
---
- name: find matching pattern files
find:
paths: "/mnt/inventory"
patterns: "hostname*"
file_type: directory
register: subdirs
- name: check files for net.ipv4.ip_forward = 0
no_log: False
lineinfile:
name: "{{ item.path }}/sysctl.conf"
line: "net.ipv4.ip_forward = 0"
state: present
with_items: "{{ subdirs.files }}"
register: conf
check_mode: yes
failed_when: (conf is changed) or (conf is failed)
- debug:
msg: "CONF OUTPUT: {{ conf }}"
But I get log output like this:
ok: [localhost] => (item={u'uid': 0, u'woth': False, u'mtime': 1546922126.0,
u'inode': 773404, u'isgid': False, u'size': 4096, u'roth': True, u'isuid':
False, u'isreg': False, u'pw_name': u'root', u'gid': 0, u'ischr': False,
u'wusr': False, u'xoth': True, u'rusr': True, u'nlink': 12, u'issock':
False, u'rgrp': True, u'gr_name': u'root', u'path':
u'/mnt/inventory/hostname999', u'xusr': True, u'atime': 1546930801.0,
u'isdir': True, u'ctime': 1546922126.0, u'wgrp': False, u'xgrp': True,
u'dev': 51, u'isblk': False, u'isfifo': False, u'mode': u'0555', u'islnk':
False})
Furthermore, my debug message of CONF OUTPUT never shows and I have no idea why not.
I have reviewed https://github.com/ansible/ansible/issues/5564 and other articles but they just seem to refer to items like shell commands that send stuff to stdout, which lineinfile does not.

Answer 1

But I get log output like this:
Then you likely want to use loop_control: with a label: "{{ item.path }}" child:
- lineinfile:
# as before
with_items: "{{ subdirs.files }}"
loop_control:
label: "{{ item.path }}"
which will get you closer to what you want:
ok: [localhost] => (item=/mnt/inventory/hostname999)
Furthermore, my debug message of CONF OUTPUT never shows and I have no idea why not.
The best guess I have for that one is that maybe the verbosity needs to be adjusted:
- debug:
msg: "CONF OUTPUT: {{ conf }}"
verbosity: 0
but it works for me, so maybe there is something else special about your ansible setup. I guess try the verbosity: and see if it helps. Given what you are actually doing with that msg:, you may be much happier with just passing conf directly to debug:
- debug:
var: conf
since it will render much nicer because ansible knows it is a dict, rather that just effectively calling str(conf) which (as you saw above) does not format very nicely.