Ansible "replace" & "lineinfile" issue

[Kanhaiya Ashtekar]

I am having a requirement where I need to replace/comment a line from rsyslog.conf file 

I am unable to correctly state the regexp. Please Help.

INADEQUATE INFORMATION AVAILABLE ONLINE.

I have been testing the following script which is failing:

YAML using "lineinfile"

---

- name: Comment out *.*@10.1.0.100 line in /etc/rsyslog.conf

  lineinfile:

      path: /etc/rsyslog.conf

      regexp: '^*\.*@10\.1\.0\.100)'

      line: '# *.* @10.1.0.100'

YAML using "replace"

---

- name: Comment out *.*@10.1.0.100 line in /etc/rsyslog.conf

  replace:

      path: /etc/rsyslog.conf

      regexp: '*.* @10.1.0.100'

      replace: '# *.* @10.1.0.100'

      

PLEASE HELP. 

####################################################################################

## CHECKED WITH ANSIBLE 2.6 DOCUMENTATION. FOLLOWED THE GIVEN INFORMATION. #####

## YET HAVING ISSUE WITH PARSING THE "REGEXP" and "REPLACE"ing                                 #####

####################################################################################

[Dick Visser]

On 16 August 2018 at 08:30, Kanhaiya Ashtekar

<ashtekar...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I am having a requirement where I need to replace/comment a line from rsyslog.conf file
> I am unable to correctly state the regexp. Please Help.
>
> INADEQUATE INFORMATION AVAILABLE ONLINE.
>
> I have been testing the following script which is failing:
>
>
> YAML using "lineinfile"
> ---
> - name: Comment out *.*@10.1.0.100 line in /etc/rsyslog.conf
> lineinfile:
> path: /etc/rsyslog.conf
> regexp: '^*\.*@10\.1\.0\.100)'
> line: '# *.* @10.1.0.100'
>

Your regex has a closing parenthesis but no starting one.
Also, the wildcard character needs to be escaped.
If your goal is to comment out whatever you matched first, then it
makes sense to use backrefs in the substituted line.
You should also use the $ to match the end of the string.
In this specific case it won't be a problem (i.e. there are probably
no instances like *.*@10.1.0.1000), but suppose you wanted to match:

*.*@10.1.0.10

then without the $ this would also match *.*@10.1.0.100, *.*@10.1.0.104, etc

This should work for you:

- name: Comment out *.*@10.1.0.100 line in /etc/rsyslog.conf
lineinfile:
path: /etc/rsyslog.conf

regexp: '^(\*\.\*@10\.1\.0\.100)'
line: '#\1'
backrefs: yes


BTW that screen capture is huge and makes it hard to read the
message... you might want to just copy/paste the text next time...


Dick