Keeping your system up to date and applying all security patches is an essential task for sysadmins and developers. One can use the apt module of Ansible to manages apt packages for Debian/Ubuntu-based Linux distros. This module can either use aptitude or apt-get command on the remote server for package management. Similarly, it would be best if you used the reboot module of Ansible to reboot a machine, wait for it to go down, come back up, and respond to commands. This page explains how to run apt/apt-get update and upgrade all packages via Ansible and reboot the machine if the need occurs.
Ansible apt update all packages using the apt module
Typically you run the following to refresh package cache using the apt-get command or apt command:
sudo apt-get update
To update repositories cache using Ansible:
- name: Update apt-get repo and cache apt: update_cache=yes force_apt_get=yes cache_valid_time=3600
Where,
update_cache=yes – Run the equivalent of apt-get update command on all servers
force_apt_get=yes – Do not use the aptitude command, instead use the apt-get command on Debian/Ubuntu boxes
cache_valid_time=3600 – Update the apt cache if its older than the cache_valid_time. This option is set in seconds. In this examples, it is set to 3600 seconds.
Upgrading all apt packages using Ansible
The syntax is:
- name: Upgrade all apt packages apt: upgrade=dist force_apt_get=yes
Where,
upgrade=dist – Run the equivalent of ‘apt-get upgrade’ command on all Ubuntu or Debian Linux servers. In other words, upgrade all packages to latest version.
force_apt_get=yes – Use apt-get instead of aptitude.
Find out if we need to reboot the servers
If the file /var/run/reboot-required exists, you need to reboot your Debian or Ubuntu Linux box. We need to register a new variable if file /var/run/reboot-required exists on the system as follows:
- name: Check if a reboot is needed for Debian and Ubuntu boxes
register: reboot_required_file
stat: path=/var/run/reboot-required get_md5=no
Where,
register: reboot_required_file – The ‘register’ keyword decides what variable to save a result in and we are going to use it as follows to reboot the box.
stat: path=/var/run/reboot-required – Determine if a path (/var/run/reboot-required) exists
get_md5=no – Algorithm to determine checksum of file. In this example, I am using md5, but you can use sha1, sha224, sha256, sha384, and sha512.
Rebooting server when a new kernel installed
You can use either command or shell module to reboot the Linux server when kernel updated as follows:
- name: Reboot the Debian or Ubuntu server
reboot:
msg: "Reboot initiated by Ansible due to kernel updates"
connect_timeout: 5
reboot_timeout: 300
pre_reboot_delay: 0
post_reboot_delay: 30
test_command: uptime
when: reboot_required_file.stat.exists
Where,
test_command: uptime – Execute uptime command on the rebooted server and expect success from to determine the machine is ready for further tasks.
when: reboot_required_file.stat.exists – First, check that the file named /var/run/reboot-required exists using a variable named reboot_required_file. The reboot module will only work if that file exists and it is enforced using ‘when: reboot_required_file.stat.exists’ Ansible condition.
Using Ansible for system updates and reboot Linux servers if necessary
Now that you are aware of basic logic let us create a new host file:
vi hosts
Append the following:
## set up ssh user name and path to python3 ## [all:vars] ansible_user='ubuntu' ansible_become=yes ansible_become_method=sudo ansible_python_interpreter='/usr/bin/env python3' ########################## ## our aws server names ## aws-ls-www-1 may be mapped using /etc/hosts or ~/.ssh/config ## you can use ip address here too ########################### [servers] aws-ls-www-1 aws-ls-www-2 aws-ls-www-3 aws-ls-www-4
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