'How to ignore specific errors in an Ansible task

If have an Ansible task, that can fails sometimes, due to some error during the creation of an user account. Especially if the user account is already in use and the user is logged in. If the task fails with a specific error message, like "user account in use" the play must continue. There is no need to fail then, but only on predefined error messages. The task looks like this.

- name: modify user
  user:
    state: "{{ user.state | default('present') }}"
    name: "{{ user.name }}"
    home: "{{ user_base_path }}/{{ user.name }}"
    createhome: true

Since it's not a shell command, I cannot simply register a var and check the output of .rc. Also I don't get stderr or stdout, when i register a var and print it in debug mode. That was my first approach on check for the error message. I am running out of ideas, how to filter for a specific error and passing the task, but failing on everything else. ignore_errors: yes is not a good solution, because the task should fail in some cases.

ansible


Solution 1:[1]

You can use register without the shell module.

Also the module has extra return values.

Check this using:

- name: modify user
  user:
    state: "{{ user.state | default('present') }}"
    name: "{{ user.name }}"
    home: "{{ user_base_path }}/{{ user.name }}"
    createhome: true
  register: modify_user_result

- name: debug
  debug:
    var: modify_user_result

Solution 2:[2]

As per ansible doc we get stdout and stderr as return fields.

I would suggest to use these.

---
- hosts: localhost
  vars:
    user:
      name: yash
    user_base_path: /tmp
  tasks:

    - name: modify user
      user:
        state: "{{ user.state | default('present') }}"
        name: "{{ user.name }}"
        home: "{{ user_base_path }}/{{ user.name }}"
        createhome: true
      register: user_status
      ignore_errors: yes

    - name: stdout_test
      debug:
        msg:  "{{ user_status.err }}"

    - name: Fail on not valid
      fail:
        msg: failed
      when: '"user account in use" not in user_status.err'

Output:

PLAY [localhost] *************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

TASK [Gathering Facts] *******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [localhost]

TASK [modify user] ***********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
fatal: [localhost]: FAILED! => {"changed": false, "err": "<main> attribute status: eDSPermissionError\n<dscl_cmd> DS Error: -14120 (eDSPermissionError)\n", "msg": "Cannot create user \"yash\".", "out": "", "rc": 40}
...ignoring

TASK [stdout_test] ***********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ok: [localhost] => {
    "msg": "<main> attribute status: eDSPermissionError\n<dscl_cmd> DS Error: -14120 (eDSPermissionError)\n"
}

TASK [Fail on not valid] *****************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
fatal: [localhost]: FAILED! => {"changed": false, "msg": "failed"}

PLAY RECAP *******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
localhost                  : ok=3    changed=0    unreachable=0    failed=1    skipped=0    rescued=0    ignored=1

Solution 3:[3]

You can use when, save the return value by the register and set_fact and then bet what will happen according to that value.

Sources

This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Overflow and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Source: Stack Overflow

Solution Source
Solution 1 Ron van der Heijden
Solution 2 error404
Solution 3 behnam hoseyni

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