Ansible vmware_vm_facts: get mac address for a specific VM and write it to existing inventory

Question

I have to goals with my plabook:

a) get mac address from a specific VM running on vsphere b) add it to my inventory file

My test environment is:
-Vsphere 6.5
-Ansible 2.7 running on Centos 7.6

I have been able to make point a) following this post How retrieve the name of specific dictionary - Ansible

Playbook:

# Deploy a guest from a template*  
- hosts: 127.0.0.1  
  vars:
    vcenter_hostname: virtvcsami1.virtlab.local  
    vcenter_user: administrator@vsphere.local  
    vcenter_pass: Esxilab!1  
    vcenter_datastore: vsanDatastore  
    vcenter_datacenter: DatacenterMI  
  tasks:  
  - name: Gather VMware guest facts  
    vmware_vm_facts:  
      validate_certs: False  
      hostname: "{{ vcenter_hostname }}"  
      username: "{{ vcenter_user }}"  
      password: "{{ vcenter_pass }}"  
      vm_type: vm  
    delegate_to: localhost  
    register: vm_guest_facts  

  - debug: msg="{{ item.value.mac_address }}"  
    loop: "{{ vm_guest_facts.virtual_machines|dict2items }}"

but now I still have two problems to solve:

Problem 1)

Playbook gets ALL virtual machines while I need to get just a VM named "testvm"

[root@nlnxmi1 testvmcdromiso]# ansible-playbook getvminfo.yml

PLAY [127.0.0.1] ***********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
TASK [Gathering Facts] *****************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [127.0.0.1]
TASK [Gather VMware guest facts] *******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [127.0.0.1 -> localhost]
TASK [debug] ***************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [127.0.0.1] => (item={'key': u'kubemst01', 'value': {u'guest_fullname': u'CentOS 7 (64-bit)', u'vm_network': {u'00:50:56:be:de:b9': {u'ipv4': [u'192.168.40.31'], u'ipv6': [u'fe80::250:56ff:febe:deb9']}, u'52:54:00:62:fe:fe': {u'ipv4': [u'192.168.122.1'], u'ipv6': []}}, u'cluster': u'VirtlabMI', u'esxi_hostname': u'virtesxmi3.virtlab.local', u'mac_address': [u'00:50:56:be:de:b9'], u'power_state': u'poweredOn', u'ip_address': u'192.168.40.31', u'uuid': u'423e7580-1ca4-a6ca-5cb4-5b8fa963d527'}}) => { "msg": [ "00:50:56:be:de:b9" ] }

ok: [127.0.0.1] => (item={'key': u'testvm', 'value': {u'guest_fullname': >u'CentOS 7 (64-bit)', u'vm_network': {}, u'cluster': u'VirtlabMI', >u'esxi_hostname': u'virtesxmi1.virtlab.local', u'mac_address': >[u'00:50:56:be:a3:a0'], u'power_state': u'poweredOn', u'ip_address': u'', >u'uuid': u'423e8645-ca2a-1097-2e1c-624810a461d1'}}) => { "msg": [ "00:50:56:be:a3:a0" ] } ......

Problem 2)

Add mac address to existing inventory file or, if not possible, at least in some file

I tried adding the following code at the end:

  - set_fact: vm_mac_address="prova"  

  - name: Register host to Inventory  
    lineinfile:  
      path: /etc/ansible/testvmcdromiso/inventory  
      regexp: '(testvm)'  
      line: '\1 macaddres={{ vm_mac_address }}'  
      backrefs: yes  

[root@nlnxmi1 testvmcdromiso]# cat inventory [testhost] testvm macaddress=prova

but as you can see I just used a "fixed" string instead I need to get the mac address from the running vm but never figure it out even after 2 days of attempts :(

I'm just a beginner with ansible. Could you please help me?

best Marco

Answer 1

Playbook gets ALL virtual machines while I need to get just a VM named "testvm"

That's not a problem. It looks like the vmware_vm_facts module returns a dictionary, so just ask for the vm you want:

  - debug: msg="{{ vm_guest_facts.virtual_machines['testvm'].mac_address }}"  

Add mac address to existing inventory file or, if not possible, at least in some file

Since you now know how to retrieve the MAC address, you modify your lineinfile task make use of that information:

  - name: Register host to Inventory  
    lineinfile:  
      path: /etc/ansible/testvmcdromiso/inventory  
      regexp: '(testvm)'  
      line: '\1 macaddres={{ vm_guest_facts.virtual_machines['testvm'].mac_address }}'  
      backrefs: yes