Get a list of --limit servers

[bmcc...@blurb.com]

I'm using the icinga2-ansible-add-hosts role, which creates config files for each host.

My playbook starts like this:

  ---

  - hosts: all

    gather_facts: True

  - hosts: "{{ hosts | default('monitoring_servers') }}"

  - strategy: debug

    - role: icinga2-ansible-add-hosts

Inside the add-hosts role is the following task:

--

- name: Copy Host Definitions

  template: src=hosts_template.j2

            dest={{ icinga2_hosts_dir }}/{{ hostvars[item]['ansible_fqdn'] }}.conf

            owner=root

            group=root

            mode=0644

  with_items: "{{ groups['all'] }}"

  notify:

   - restart icinga2

When I run `ansible-playbook -i inventory/ --limit <GROUP> icinga2.yml -vvv` I notice that gather_facts is only done on the hosts in <GROUP>, but the template tries to generate config files for all of my hosts, because "{{ groups['all'] }}" contains all of the hosts in the inventory directory, not just those in <GROUP>.

Checking Google and IRC it seems like there is no way to programmatically get the list of machines specified by --limit.  Is that correct?  Is there a way to iterate over a list of hosts that were specified on the command line?

[Brian Coca]

​try the 'play_hosts' variable.​

----------

Brian Coca

[bmcc...@blurb.com]

'play_hosts' doesn't work because the 'icinga2-ansible-add-hosts' role is only applied to "{{ hosts | default('monitoring_servers') }}"

What I'm trying to get is the list of hosts that 

- hosts: all

  gather_facts: yes

runs against, which is not all of the hosts in my inventory.

[J Hawkesworth]

If you just want to make sure you are going to hit the right hosts before you run the playbook, use the --list-hosts command line parameter option of ansible-playbook.

I use --list-hosts and --list-tasks a lot.

Hope this helps,

Jon