.. _nios_guide: ************************ Infoblox Guide ************************ .. contents:: Topics This guide describes how to use Ansible with the Infoblox Network Identity Operating System (NIOS). With Ansible integration, you can use Ansible playbooks to automate Infoblox Core Network Services for IP address management (IPAM), DNS, and inventory tracking. You can review simple example tasks in the documentation for any of the :ref:`NIOS modules ` or look at the `Use cases with modules`_ section for more elaborate examples. See the `Infoblox `_ website for more information on the Infoblox product. .. note:: You can retrieve most of the example playbooks used in this guide from the `network-automation/infoblox_ansible `_ GitHub repository. Prerequisites ============= Before using Ansible ``nios`` modules with Infoblox, you must install the ``infoblox-client`` on your Ansible control node: .. code-block:: bash $ sudo pip install infoblox-client .. note:: You need an NIOS account with the WAPI feature enabled to use Ansible with Infoblox. .. _nios_credentials: Credentials and authenticating ============================== To use Infoblox ``nios`` modules in playbooks, you need to configure the credentials to access your Infoblox system. The examples in this guide use credentials stored in ``/group_vars/nios.yml``. Replace these values with your Infoblox credentials: .. code-block:: yaml --- nios_provider: host: 192.0.0.2 username: admin password: ansible NIOS lookup plugins =================== Ansible includes the following lookup plugins for NIOS: - :ref:`nios ` Uses the Infoblox WAPI API to fetch NIOS specified objects, for example network views, DNS views, and host records. - :ref:`nios_next_ip ` Provides the next available IP address from a network. You'll see an example of this in `Creating a host record`_. - :ref:`nios_next_network ` - Returns the next available network range for a network-container. You must run the NIOS lookup plugins locally by specifying ``connection: local``. See :ref:`lookup plugins ` for more detail. Retrieving all network views ---------------------------- To retrieve all network views and save them in a variable, use the :ref:`set_fact ` module with the :ref:`nios ` lookup plugin: .. code-block:: yaml --- - hosts: nios connection: local tasks: - name: fetch all networkview objects set_fact: networkviews: "{{ lookup('nios', 'networkview', provider=nios_provider) }}" - name: check the networkviews debug: var: networkviews Retrieving a host record ------------------------ To retrieve a set of host records, use the ``set_fact`` module with the ``nios`` lookup plugin and include a filter for the specific hosts you want to retrieve: .. code-block:: yaml --- - hosts: nios connection: local tasks: - name: fetch host leaf01 set_fact: host: "{{ lookup('nios', 'record:host', filter={'name': 'leaf01.ansible.com'}, provider=nios_provider) }}" - name: check the leaf01 return variable debug: var: host - name: debug specific variable (ipv4 address) debug: var: host.ipv4addrs[0].ipv4addr - name: fetch host leaf02 set_fact: host: "{{ lookup('nios', 'record:host', filter={'name': 'leaf02.ansible.com'}, provider=nios_provider) }}" - name: check the leaf02 return variable debug: var: host If you run this ``get_host_record.yml`` playbook, you should see results similar to the following: .. code-block:: none $ ansible-playbook get_host_record.yml PLAY [localhost] *************************************************************************************** TASK [fetch host leaf01] ****************************************************************************** ok: [localhost] TASK [check the leaf01 return variable] ************************************************************* ok: [localhost] => { < ...output shortened...> "host": { "ipv4addrs": [ { "configure_for_dhcp": false, "host": "leaf01.ansible.com", } ], "name": "leaf01.ansible.com", "view": "default" } } TASK [debug specific variable (ipv4 address)] ****************************************************** ok: [localhost] => { "host.ipv4addrs[0].ipv4addr": "192.168.1.11" } TASK [fetch host leaf02] ****************************************************************************** ok: [localhost] TASK [check the leaf02 return variable] ************************************************************* ok: [localhost] => { < ...output shortened...> "host": { "ipv4addrs": [ { "configure_for_dhcp": false, "host": "leaf02.example.com", "ipv4addr": "192.168.1.12" } ], } } PLAY RECAP ****************************************************************************************** localhost : ok=5 changed=0 unreachable=0 failed=0 The output above shows the host record for ``leaf01.ansible.com`` and ``leaf02.ansible.com`` that were retrieved by the ``nios`` lookup plugin. This playbook saves the information in variables which you can use in other playbooks. This allows you to use Infoblox as a single source of truth to gather and use information that changes dynamically. See :ref:`playbooks_variables` for more information on using Ansible variables. See the :ref:`nios ` examples for more data options that you can retrieve. You can access these playbooks at `Infoblox lookup playbooks `_. Use cases with modules ====================== You can use the ``nios`` modules in tasks to simplify common Infoblox workflows. Be sure to set up your :ref:`NIOS credentials` before following these examples. Configuring an IPv4 network --------------------------- To configure an IPv4 network, use the :ref:`nios_network ` module: .. code-block:: yaml --- - hosts: nios connection: local tasks: - name: Create a network on the default network view nios_network: network: 192.168.100.0/24 comment: sets the IPv4 network options: - name: domain-name value: ansible.com state: present provider: "{{nios_provider}}" Notice the last parameter, ``provider``, uses the variable ``nios_provider`` defined in the ``group_vars/`` directory. Creating a host record ---------------------- To create a host record named `leaf03.ansible.com` on the newly-created IPv4 network: .. code-block:: yaml --- - hosts: nios connection: local tasks: - name: configure an IPv4 host record nios_host_record: name: leaf03.ansible.com ipv4addrs: - ipv4addr: "{{ lookup('nios_next_ip', '192.168.100.0/24', provider=nios_provider)[0] }}" state: present provider: "{{nios_provider}}" Notice the IPv4 address in this example uses the :ref:`nios_next_ip ` lookup plugin to find the next available IPv4 address on the network. Creating a forward DNS zone --------------------------- To configure a forward DNS zone use, the ``nios_zone`` module: .. code-block:: yaml --- - hosts: nios connection: local tasks: - name: Create a forward DNS zone called ansible-test.com nios_zone: name: ansible-test.com comment: local DNS zone state: present provider: "{{ nios_provider }}" Creating a reverse DNS zone --------------------------- To configure a reverse DNS zone: .. code-block:: yaml --- - hosts: nios connection: local tasks: - name: configure a reverse mapping zone on the system using IPV6 zone format nios_zone: name: 100::1/128 zone_format: IPV6 state: present provider: "{{ nios_provider }}" Dynamic inventory script ======================== You can use the Infoblox dynamic inventory script to import your network node inventory with Infoblox NIOS. To gather the inventory from Infoblox, you need two files: - `infoblox.yaml `_ - A file that specifies the NIOS provider arguments and optional filters. - `infoblox.py `_ - The python script that retrieves the NIOS inventory. To use the Infoblox dynamic inventory script: #. Download the ``infoblox.yaml`` file and save it in the ``/etc/ansible`` directory. #. Modify the ``infoblox.yaml`` file with your NIOS credentials. #. Download the ``infoblox.py`` file and save it in the ``/etc/ansible/hosts`` directory. #. Change the permissions on the ``infoblox.py`` file to make the file an executable: .. code-block:: bash $ sudo chmod +x /etc/ansible/hosts/infoblox.py You can optionally use ``./infoblox.py --list`` to test the script. After a few minutes, you should see your Infoblox inventory in JSON format. You can explicitly use the Infoblox dynamic inventory script as follows: .. code-block:: bash $ ansible -i infoblox.py all -m ping You can also implicitly use the Infoblox dynamic inventory script by including it in your inventory directory (``etc/ansible/hosts`` by default). See :ref:`dynamic_inventory` for more details. .. seealso:: `Infoblox website `_ The Infoblox website `Infoblox and Ansible Deployment Guide `_ The deployment guide for Ansible integration provided by Infoblox. `Infoblox Integration in Ansible 2.5 `_ Ansible blog post about Infoblox. :ref:`Ansible NIOS modules ` The list of supported NIOS modules, with examples. `Infoblox Ansible Examples `_ Infoblox example playbooks.