ansibleansible-rolefile-organization

How to split an ansible role's `defaults/main.yml` file into multiple files?

In some ansible roles (e.g. roles/my-role/) I've got quite some big default variables files (defaults/main.yml). I'd like to split the main.yml into several smaller files. Is it possible to do that?

I've tried creating the files defaults/1.yml and defaults/2.yml, but they aren't loaded by ansible.

Solution

  • The feature I'm describing below has been available since Ansible 2.6, but got a bugfix in v2.6.2 and another (minor) one in v2.7.
    To see a solution for older versions, see Paul's answer.

    defaults/main/

    Instead of creating defaults/main.yml, create a directory — defaults/main/ — and place all YAML files in there.

    Ansible will load any *.yml file inside that directory, so you can name your files like roles/my-role/defaults/main/{1,2}.yml.

    Furthermore, it's even possible to create sub-directories like roles/my-role/defaults/main/subdir_1/foo.yml.

    Note, the old file — defaults/main.yml — must not exist. See this Github comment.

    vars/main/

    By the way, the above solution also works for vars/:

    further details

    The feature has been introduced in v2.6 — git commit, Pull Request, main Github issue.

    There have been two bugfixes: