.. _vmware_ansible_inventory:

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Using VMware dynamic inventory plugin
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.. contents:: Topics

VMware Dynamic Inventory Plugin
===============================


The best way to interact with your hosts is to use the VMware dynamic inventory plugin, which dynamically queries VMware APIs and
tells Ansible what nodes can be managed.

To be able to use this VMware dynamic inventory plugin, you need to enable it first by specifying the following in the ``ansible.cfg`` file:

.. code-block:: ini

  [inventory]
  enable_plugins = vmware_vm_inventory

Then, create a file that ends in ``.vmware.yml`` or ``.vmware.yaml`` in your working directory.

The ``vmware_vm_inventory`` script takes in the same authentication information as any VMware module.

Here's an example of a valid inventory file:

.. code-block:: yaml

    plugin: vmware_vm_inventory
    strict: False
    hostname: 10.65.223.31
    username: administrator@vsphere.local
    password: Esxi@123$%
    validate_certs: False
    with_tags: True


Executing ``ansible-inventory --list -i <filename>.vmware.yml`` will create a list of VMware instances that are ready to be configured using Ansible.

Using vaulted configuration files
=================================

Since the inventory configuration file contains vCenter password in plain text, a security risk, you may want to
encrypt your entire inventory configuration file.

You can encrypt a valid inventory configuration file as follows:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ ansible-vault encrypt <filename>.vmware.yml
      New Vault password:
      Confirm New Vault password:
      Encryption successful

And you can use this vaulted inventory configuration file using:

.. code-block:: bash

    $ ansible-inventory -i filename.vmware.yml --list --vault-password-file=/path/to/vault_password_file


.. seealso::

    `pyVmomi <https://github.com/vmware/pyvmomi>`_
        The GitHub Page of pyVmomi
    `pyVmomi Issue Tracker <https://github.com/vmware/pyvmomi/issues>`_
        The issue tracker for the pyVmomi project
    :ref:`working_with_playbooks`
        An introduction to playbooks
    :ref:`playbooks_vault`
        Using Vault in playbooks