Restrict ansible features to an older version? - ansible

Question

In my work environment I have already upgraded to a newer ansible version than what co-workers have. By accident I keep using features that their version does not have yet.
Is there a way to prevent this on my side in that I force ansible to pretend it is actually an older version?

Answer 1

You can use python virtual environments to handle multiple ansible versions. I use pyenv to manage virtualenvs. Here is how you can do it in bash on Linux:
Install pyenv:
You can change paths according to your liking if you don't want default paths.
git clone https://github.com/pyenv/pyenv.git ${HOME}/.pyenv
echo 'export PYENV_ROOT="$HOME/.pyenv"' >> ${HOME}/.bashrc
echo 'export PATH="$PYENV_ROOT/bin:$PATH"' >> ${HOME}/.bashrc
echo 'if command -v pyenv 1>/dev/null 2>&1; then eval "$(pyenv init -)"; fi' >> ${HOME}/.bashrc
Install pyenv virtualenv for user:
git clone https://github.com/pyenv/pyenv-virtualenv.git ${HOME}/.pyenv/plugins/pyenv-virtualenv
echo 'eval "$(pyenv virtualenv-init -)"' >> ~/.bashrc
export PYENV_VIRTUALENV_DISABLE_PROMPT=1
Initialize pyenv environment for current shell
eval "$(pyenv init -)"
eval "$(pyenv virtualenv-init -)"
Install older ansible in one virtualenv:
pyenv virtualenv old_env
pyenv activate old_env
pip install ansible==2.4
Install newer ansible in other virtualenv:
pyenv virtualenv new_env
pyenv activate new_env
pip install ansible==2.7
Daily Usage:
You can switch between virtualenvs whenver you want. e.g. to switch to old ansible virtualenv and check ansible version, you can do like this:
pyenv activate old_env
ansible --version