Handle Host Unreachable cases or Test SSH Connectivity in yml playbook

[Anas Theo]

Hello,

Is there any easy way to handle "host unreachable" cases in order to debug in a log file the problematic situation ? As an alternative it could also be useful to test SSH connectivity through explicit commands in all remote hosts before executing the rest of the .yml file. Thanks for your help. 

[Kai Stian Olstad]

On 13. okt. 2016 15:42, 'Anas Theo' via Ansible Project wrote:
> As an alternative it could also
> be useful to test SSH connectivity through explicit commands in all remote
> hosts before executing the rest of the .yml file. Thanks for your help.

If you have gather_facts as true and set "any_errors_fatal: true", it
will stop at the setup task(gathering of facts) and not proceed any task
or roles if one host fails.

If gather_facts is false you can make a dummy task with ping module in
pre_tasks like so

---
- hosts: all
any_errors_fatal: true
pre_tasks:
- ping:

--
Kai Stian Olstad

[Anas Theo]

Hello Kai,

Indeed, I can use ping to test the connectivity in all servers, hower the fatar error again can't be handled for example in a conditional form.

What I request is to be able to handle this result "fatal: [sles_11]: UNREACHABLE! => {"changed": false, "msg": "Failed to connect to the host via ssh.", "unreachable": true}" , in order to for example to be able to write a message in a local log file. 

This case is also describer in documentation of ansible:

"You can change this behavior with the --force-handlers command-line option, or by including force_handlers: True in a play, or force_handlers = True in ansible.cfg. When handlers are forced, they will run when notified even if a task fails on that host. (Note that certain errors could still prevent the handler from running, such as a host becoming unreachable.)"

Is there any option to overcome this problem?

Thank you very much.