Cisco NXOS supports multiple connections. This page offers details on how each connection works in Ansible 2.6 and how to use it.
Topics
CLI | NX-API | |
---|---|---|
Protocol | SSH | HTTP(S) |
Credentials
|
uses SSH keys / SSH-agent if present
accepts
-u myuser -k if using password |
uses HTTPS certificates if present
|
Indirect Access | via a bastion (jump host) | via a web proxy |
Connection Settings
|
ansible_connection: network_cli |
ansible_connection: httpapi OR
ansible_connection: local with
transport: nxapi in the
provider dictionary |
Enable Mode
(Privilege Escalation)
supported as of 2.5.3
|
supported - use
ansible_become: yes with
ansible_become_method: enable and
ansible_become_pass: |
not supported by NX-API
|
Returned Data Format | stdout[0]. |
stdout[0].messages[0]. |
For legacy playbooks, NXOS still supports ansible_connection: local
. We recommend modernizing to use ansible_connection: network_cli
or ansible_connection: httpapi
as soon as possible.
group_vars/nxos.yml
¶ansible_connection: network_cli
ansible_network_os: nxos
ansible_user: myuser
ansible_ssh_pass: !vault...
ansible_become: yes
ansible_become_method: enable
ansible_become_pass: !vault...
ansible_ssh_common_args: '-o ProxyCommand="ssh -W %h:%p -q bastion01"'
ansible_ssh_pass
configuration.ansible_ssh_common_args
configuration.ProxyCommand
directive. To prevent secrets from leaking out (for example in ps
output), SSH does not support providing passwords via environment variables.- name: Backup current switch config (nxos)
nxos_config:
backup: yes
register: backup_nxos_location
when: ansible_network_os == 'nxos'
Before you can use NX-API to connect to a switch, you must enable NX-API. To enable NX-API on a new switch via Ansible, use the nxos_nxapi
module via the CLI connection. Set up group_vars/nxos.yml just like in the CLI example above, then run a playbook task like this:
- name: Enable NX-API
nxos_nxapi:
enable_http: yes
enable_https: yes
when: ansible_network_os == 'nxos'
To find out more about the options for enabling HTTP/HTTPS and local http see the nxos_nxapi module documentation.
Once NX-API is enabled, change your group_vars/nxos.yml
to use the NX-API connection.
group_vars/nxos.yml
¶ansible_connection: httpapi
ansible_network_os: nxos
ansible_user: myuser
ansible_ssh_pass: !vault...
proxy_env:
http_proxy: http://proxy.example.com:8080
proxy_env
configuration.https
, change http_proxy
to https_proxy
.- name: Backup current switch config (nxos)
nxos_config:
backup: yes
register: backup_nxos_location
environment: "{{ proxy_env }}"
when: ansible_network_os == 'nxos'
In this example the proxy_env
variable defined in group_vars
gets passed to the environment
option of the module used in the task.
Warning
Never store passwords in plain text. We recommend using SSH keys to authenticate SSH connections. Ansible supports ssh-agent to manage your SSH keys. If you must use passwords to authenticate SSH connections, we recommend encrypting them with Ansible Vault.