FRR in a Docker container: socket_path must be a value

[Saqib Ilyas]

Hi

I used containerlab to set up a small topology with a few FRR routers running as Docker containers. Accordingly, I set ansible_connection: Docker. However, when I run the following playbook:

- name: testing facts

hosts: routers

tasks:

- name: Do not collect hardware facts

frr.frr.frr_facts:

gather_subset:

- config

 I get the following error:

An exception occurred during task execution. To see the full traceback, use -vvv. The error was: AssertionError: socket_path must be a value

fatal: [172.20.20.5]: FAILED! => {"changed": false, "module_stderr": "Traceback (most recent call last):\n  File \"/root/.ansible/tmp/ansible-tmp-1626200560.5446706-211173012575608/AnsiballZ_frr_facts.py\", line 102, in <module>\n    _ansiballz_main()\n  File \"/root/.ansible/tmp/ansible-tmp-1626200560.5446706-211173012575608/AnsiballZ_frr_facts.py\", line 94, in _ansiballz_main\n    invoke_module(zipped_mod, temp_path, ANSIBALLZ_PARAMS)\n  File \"/root/.ansible/tmp/ansible-tmp-1626200560.5446706-211173012575608/AnsiballZ_frr_facts.py\", line 40, in invoke_module\n    runpy.run_module(mod_name='ansible_collections.frr.frr.plugins.modules.frr_facts', init_globals=None, run_name='__main__', alter_sys=True)\n  File \"/usr/lib/python3.8/runpy.py\", line 207, in run_module\n    return _run_module_code(code, init_globals, run_name, mod_spec)\n  File \"/usr/lib/python3.8/runpy.py\", line 97, in _run_module_code\n    _run_code(code, mod_globals, init_globals,\n  File \"/usr/lib/python3.8/runpy.py\", line 87, in _run_code\n    exec(code, run_globals)\n  File \"/tmp/ansible_frr.frr.frr_facts_payload_dcxvzx4f/ansible_frr.frr.frr_facts_payload.zip/ansible_collections/frr/frr/plugins/modules/frr_facts.py\", line 425, in <module>\n  File \"/tmp/ansible_frr.frr.frr_facts_payload_dcxvzx4f/ansible_frr.frr.frr_facts_payload.zip/ansible_collections/frr/frr/plugins/modules/frr_facts.py\", line 410, in main\n  File \"/tmp/ansible_frr.frr.frr_facts_payload_dcxvzx4f/ansible_frr.frr.frr_facts_payload.zip/ansible_collections/frr/frr/plugins/modules/frr_facts.py\", line 134, in __init__\n  File \"/tmp/ansible_frr.frr.frr_facts_payload_dcxvzx4f/ansible_frr.frr.frr_facts_payload.zip/ansible_collections/frr/frr/plugins/module_utils/network/frr/frr.py\", line 18, in get_capabilities\n  File \"/tmp/ansible_frr.frr.frr_facts_payload_dcxvzx4f/ansible_frr.frr.frr_facts_payload.zip/ansible/module_utils/connection.py\", line 121, in __init__\nAssertionError: socket_path must be a value\n", "module_stdout": "", "msg": "MODULE FAILURE\nSee stdout/stderr for the exact error", "rc": 1}

I tried ansible_connection: network_cli, but that tries to connect to port 22, and SSH server isn't running on the FRR containers. Is there a way to direct Ansible to use vtysh to connect to the containers?

Thanks and best regards

Saqib