Ansible Windows workstation configuration

This Ansible playbook is an example for automated software installation. It is used to configure my Workstation.

Tested with Fedora(native) and Debian on Windows WSL!

Install Ansible

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install software-properties-common
sudo apt-get -y install python-pip python-dev libffi-dev libssl-dev
sudo pip install ansible

Requirements for Ansible host

The ansible host has to be a Linux machine. For the case that only a Windows (10!!!) Machine is availible, install the Linux Subsystem on the device.

Afterwards install pywinrm:

## for debian and ubuntu under windows wsl
sudo pip install pywinrm
## for debian and ubuntu
sudo apt-get install python3-winrm
## for fedora
sudo dnf install python3-winrm

WinRM Setup

on windows host

To access the client machines from remote winrm is used.

Windows setup guide, see Chapter Setup WinRM

Run as administrator in powershell!

$url = "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ansible/ansible/devel/examples/scripts/ConfigureRemotingForAnsible.ps1"
$file = "$env:temp\ConfigureRemotingForAnsible.ps1"

(New-Object -TypeName System.Net.WebClient).DownloadFile($url, $file)

powershell.exe -ExecutionPolicy ByPass -File $file

Requirements for yml file

Change ansible_user and ansible_password in the vars section before running the script!

Run on Ansible host

ansible-playbook \
  windows-rtlab-test.yml \
  -i "<ip-address>," --user "<user_name>" --ask-pass

  #ansible-playbook windows-rtlab-test.yml -i "192.168.120.235," --user "John Doe" --ask-pass

Warning: The command above needs a comma separated list of arguments, thus the comma at the end of the IP Address.

Set password and username in yml file instead of command line

Instead of passing the username and password arguments in the command line, you can set them inside the yml file (uncomment the lines ansible_user and ansible_password, and set both)

Afterwards run the following command:

ansible-playbook \
  windows-rtlab-test.yml \
  -i "192.168.120.235,"

  #ansible-playbook windows-rtlab-test.yml -i "192.168.120.235,"

Using inventory

Instead of passing the ip-addresses as arguments, they can be written into the inventoryfile (default: /etc/ansible/hosts)

# IP without any group
192.168.120.144

[group_name_1]
192.168.120.48
192.168.120.77

[group_name_2]
192.168.120.77 #same IP linke in Group group_name_1
192.168.120.79
192.168.120.119

Afterwards, the following shell commands can be used:

$ ansible-playbook <File_Name>
# or with a group
$ ansible-playbook <File_Name> -l group_name_1

Git for Windows

on ansible host

In order to do the cloning of git repositories on the windows machine, clone this repository to any location.

git clone git@github.com:tivrobo/ansible-win_git.git

Change into the new folder and copy the two files win_git.ps1 and win_git.py into DEFAULT_MODULE_UTILS_PATH:

sudo cp ./win_git.ps1 /usr/share/ansible/plugins/module_utils
sudo cp ./win_git.py /usr/share/ansible/plugins/module_utils

on windows host

The git clone only works if the ssh key of the device is given to Git in advance and the git clone command was used once.

Generate an ssh key in Powershell.

Copy the output of cat [Ctrl + Shift + C] and follow this instruction from Step 2

RT-CUSTOMZ / lab-ansible-cad-workstation-configuration