ucsm-ansible

• Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License")

News

Note that active development for Ansible modules has moved to the Ansible collection maintained at https://galaxy.ansible.com/cisco/ucs. More information on collections can be found at https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/latest/user_guide/collections_using.html.

Ansible 2.10 and later releases move all Cisco modules (UCS, ACI, etc.) into collections. Ansible 2.10 will maintain backward compatibility with existing use of modules in Core (e.g., you can still can ucs_vlans with 2.10), but later releases will require use of the Galaxy hosted collections (e.g., eventually you must use cisco.ucs.ucs_vlans).

Archived Information

Cisco's demo Cloud (dcloud.cisco.com) can be used to test and demo the Ansible modules and corresponding roles. dCloud provides both a Hardware based environment (https://dcloud2-rtp.cisco.com/content/catalogue?search=unified%20computing%20system ) and an emulated environment (https://dcloud2-sjc.cisco.com/content/catalogue?search=ucs%20programmability ) that can be used with the UCS Ansible modules.

Modules submitted to Ansible are also used in roles now available on Ansible Galaxy: https://galaxy.ansible.com/ciscoucs/ucs

Current Development Status

Configuration Category	Configuration Task	Module Name	Status (part of 2.5, Proof of Concept, TBD
LAN	IP Addresses for KVM Access	ucs_ip_pool	in 2.5
	MAC Address Pools	ucs_mac_pool	in 2.5
	VLANs	ucs_vlans	in 2.5
	vNIC Templates	ucs_vnic_template	in 2.5
	LAN Connectivity Policy	ucs_lan_connectivity	in 2.5
	Network Control Policy	ucs_network_control	planned for 2.9
	Port Channels	use ucs_managed_objects	See lan/port_channels at https://galaxy.ansible.com/ciscoucs/ucs
SAN	WWNN Pools	ucs_wwn_pool	in 2.5
	WWPN Pools	ucs_wwn_pool	in 2.5
	VSANs	ucs_vsans	in 2.5
	vHBA Templates	ucs_vhba_template	in 2.5
	SAN Connectivity Policy	ucs_san_connectivity	in 2.5
Server	UUID Suffix Pool	ucs_uuid_pool	in 2.7
	Server Pool	use ucs_managed_objects	See servers/server_pools at https://galaxy.ansible.com/ciscoucs/ucs
	Server BIOS Policy	use ucs_managed_objects	See servers/bios_policies at https://galaxy.ansible.com/ciscoucs/ucs
	FW/Power/Maintenance Polices	use ucs_managed_objects	See servers/power_policies at https://galaxy.ansible.com/ciscoucs/ucs
	Boot Policy	use ucs_managed_objects	See servers/boot_policies at https://galaxy.ansible.com/ciscoucs/ucs
	Service Profile Template	ucs_service_profile_template	in 2.8
	Service Profile from Template	ucs_service_profile_from_template	Planned for 2.9
	Service Profile assoc/disassoc	ucs_service_profile_association	Planned for 2.9
Admin	NTP	use ucs_managed_objects	See admin/ntp at https://galaxy.ansible.com/ciscoucs/ucs
	Timezone	ucs_timezone	in 2.7
Chassis	Zoning, Profiles, etc.	see ucs_chassis_ modules	Planned for 2.9
Storage	Local disk, Profiles, etc.	see ucs_storage_ modules	in 2.8

Ansible Development Notes

See https://github.com/CiscoUcs/ucsm-ansible/blob/master/Development.md for details.

Install

Ansible must be installed. You can use pip to install:

sudo pip install ansible

• If you don't have pip installed, here's how to install pip:

wget https://bootstrap.pypa.io/get-pip.py
python get-pip.py

The UCSM Ansible modules depend on the UCSM Python SDK. Here's how to install the ucsmsdk.

sudo pip install ucsmsdk

• If you would like the latest ucsmsdk from GitHub, here is an alternate install method:

sudo pip install git+https://github.com/CiscoUcs/ucsmsdk.git

It is a good idea to verify that the ucsmsdk can connect to the domains you want to manage with Ansible. Here is an example connection test using python:

# python
Python 2.7.14 (default, Apr 27 2018, 14:31:56) 
[GCC 4.8.5 20150623 (Red Hat 4.8.5-11)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> from ucsmsdk import ucshandle
>>> handle = ucshandle.UcsHandle(ip='172.22.250.236', username='admin', password='password')
>>> handle.login()
True

Using Ansible modules from this repository

Ansible 2.5 and later include several UCSM modules. If you need more recent content you can clone and use this repository:

git clone https://github.com/ciscoucs/ucsm-ansible

After cloning this repository to a local directory Ansible will find the repo's library directory as a modules path for any playbooks residing in the ucsm-ansible directory. If Ansible reports that it cannot find a module from the library directory, you will need to specfiy the cloned repository as a library location in your .ansible.cfg file. Here is .ansible.cfg example content:

[defaults]
library = <path to ucsm-ansible clone>/library

Example usage

Once Ansible is installed you can create inventory files and playbooks to manage your UCS domains. Each module supports ansible-doc which includes example usage:

# ansible-doc ucs_vlans
<snip>
EXAMPLES:
- name: Configure VLAN
  ucs_vlans:
    hostname: 172.16.143.150
    username: admin
    password: password
    name: vlan2
    id: '2'
    native: 'yes'

This repository includes an example inventory file that can be edited with information for the UCSM domain you want to configure:

# vi inventory
[ucs]
ucs1 ucs_hostname=192.168.1.1 ucs_username=admin ucs_password=password ucs_state=present

An example_playbook.yml playbook is also included to test VLAN configuration on the UCSM domain given in the inventory file:

# vi example_playbook.yml 

---
# Example Playbook: VLAN configuration using the [ucs] hosts group
- hosts: ucs
  connection: local
  gather_facts: no
  tasks:
  - name: Configure VLAN
    ucs_vlans:
      hostname: "{{ ucs_hostname }}"
      username: "{{ ucs_username }}"
      password: "{{ ucs_password }}"
      state: "{{ ucs_state }}"
      name: vlan2
      id: '2'
      native: 'no'

Ansible will use data from the inventory file for the "{{ ucs_... }}" variables above. Multiple UCSM domains can be listed in the inventory file and Ansible will configure all the listed domains in parallel using host specific data in place of the "{{ ucs_... }}" variables.

The ansible-playbook command can be used to run the above playbook and inventory file:

# ansible-playbook -i inventory example_playbook.yml

PLAY [ucs] *********************************************************************

TASK [Configure VLAN] **********************************************************
changed: [ucs1]

PLAY RECAP *********************************************************************
ucs1                       : ok=1    changed=1    unreachable=0    failed=0   

Community:

• We are on Slack - slack requires registration, but the ucspython team is open invitation to anyone to register here