ansible-experiments/roles/users

Users

Ansible roles to create/configure users on Linux/FreeBSD.

Variables

user_groups
name	name of the group	Data type
gid	Optionally set the group ID	int
state	whether the group shoud be created or removed	present/absent

users
variable name	Description	Data type
name	username	string
state	whether the user should be created or removed	present/absent
password	string of an encrypted value(1)	string
groups	additional groups the user should belong to	list
uid	optionally specify a user id	int
keys	list of dictionaries	list
shell_lines	list of dictionaries	list

(1) https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/latest/reference_appendices/faq.html#how-do-i-generate-crypted-passwords-for-the-user-module

Default variables

The default shells depending on the OS are:

• Linux: /bin/bash
• FreeBSD: /bin/cshrc

This is defined in the defaults section of the users role

Example inventory

user_groups:
  - name: mygroup
    gid: 700


users:
  - name: remember
    state: present
    password: "blabla"
    groups:
      - mygroup
    uid: 1100
    keys:
      - file: key1
        state: present
    shell_lines:
      - line: "export SSH_AUTH_SOCK=$HOME/.gnupg/S.gpg-agent.ssh"
        state: present
      - line: "alias ls='ls lah'"
        state: present
  - name: test
    keys:
      - file: key2
        state: absent
    shell_lines:
      - line: "export SSH_AUTH_SOCK=$HOME/.gnupg/S.gpg-agent.ssh"
        state: absent

Using the Role

Example Playbook

---
- name: Manage user configuration
  hosts: all
  remote_user: root
  roles:
    - users

Configure a user's ssh keys

For every user a directory matching the username should be created under the keys folder in the role's files folder. In this folder the user's ssh keys can be stored.

├── files
│   └── keys
│       ├── remember
│       │   └── key1.pub
│       └── test
│           └── key2.pub

The name of the file holding the key should match the name in the users variable

    keys:
      - file: key1
        state: present

Configure a user's shell

This role allows you to add or remove lines to a user's .bashrc or cshrc file. Since this is not based on a template that overwrites the complete file, users can still add their own configuration too.

Add items to the shell_lines key in the users variable. Each item exists of a line and state key.

Example:

shell_lines:
  - line: "testline"
    state: absent
  - line: "export SSH_AUTH_SOCK=$HOME/.gnupg/S.gpg-agent.ssh"
    state: present
  - line: "alias ls='ls lah'"
    state: present