Question:
I would like to set an ansible variable to some default value but only if the variable is undefined. Otherwise I would like to keep it unchanged.
I tried these two approaches and both of them produce recursive loop:
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namespace: "{{namespace|default(default_namespace)}}" namespace: "{% if namespace is defined %}{{namespace}}{% else %}{{default_namespace}}{% endif %}" |
Answer:
It seems like you are taking a wrong approach.
Take a look at the Ansible documentation concerning variable precedence. It is a built-in feature of Ansible to use the default variable if the variable is not defined.
In Ansible 2.x the variable precedence starts like this:
role defaults
inventory vars
So if you want to define a default value for a variable you should set it in role/defaults/main.yml. Ansible will use that value only if the variable is not defined somewhere else.
Another option is to use a Jinja2 filter. With a Jinja filter you can set a default value for a variable like this:
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{{ some_variable | default(5) }} |