copy – Copies files to remote locations
Synopsis
- The
copy
module copies a file from the local or remote machine to a location on the remote machine. Use the fetch module to copy files from remote locations to the local box. If you need variable interpolation in copied files, use the template module. - For Windows targets, use the win_copy module instead.
Parameters
Parameter | Choices/Defaults | Comments |
---|---|---|
attributes
-
added in 2.3
|
Attributes the file or directory should have. To get supported flags look at the man page for
chattr on the target system. This string should contain the attributes in the same order as the one displayed by
lsattr.
= operator is assumed as default, otherwise
+ or
- operators need to be included in the string.
aliases: attr |
|
backup
boolean
|
|
Create a backup file including the timestamp information so you can get the original file back if you somehow clobbered it incorrectly.
|
checksum
-
added in 2.5
|
SHA1 checksum of the file being transferred. Used to validate that the copy of the file was successful.
If this is not provided, ansible will use the local calculated checksum of the src file.
|
|
content
-
|
When used instead of
src, sets the contents of a file directly to the specified value. For anything advanced or with formatting also look at the template module.
|
|
decrypt
boolean
added in 2.4
|
|
This option controls the autodecryption of source files using vault.
|
dest
- /
required
|
Remote absolute path where the file should be copied to. If
src is a directory, this must be a directory too. If
dest is a nonexistent path and if either
dest ends with "/" or
src is a directory,
dest is created. If
src and
dest are files, the parent directory of
dest isn't created: the task fails if it doesn't already exist.
|
|
directory_mode
-
added in 1.5
|
When doing a recursive copy set the mode for the directories. If this is not set we will use the system defaults. The mode is only set on directories which are newly created, and will not affect those that already existed.
|
|
follow
boolean
added in 1.8
|
|
This flag indicates that filesystem links in the destination, if they exist, should be followed.
|
force
boolean
|
|
the default is
yes , which will replace the remote file when contents are different than the source. If
no , the file will only be transferred if the destination does not exist.
aliases: thirsty |
group
-
|
Name of the group that should own the file/directory, as would be fed to
chown.
|
|
local_follow
boolean
added in 2.4
|
|
This flag indicates that filesystem links in the source tree, if they exist, should be followed.
|
mode
-
|
Mode the file or directory should be. For those used to
/usr/bin/chmod remember that modes are actually octal numbers. You must either add a leading zero so that Ansible's YAML parser knows it is an octal number (like
0644 or
01777 ) or quote it (like
'644' or
'1777' ) so Ansible receives a string and can do its own conversion from string into number. Giving Ansible a number without following one of these rules will end up with a decimal number which will have unexpected results. As of version 1.8, the mode may be specified as a symbolic mode (for example,
u+rwx or
u=rw,g=r,o=r ). As of version 2.3, the mode may also be the special string
preserve .
preserve means that the file will be given the same permissions as the source file.
|
|
owner
-
|
Name of the user that should own the file/directory, as would be fed to
chown.
|
|
remote_src
boolean
added in 2.0
|
|
If
no , it will search for
src at originating/master machine.
If
yes it will go to the remote/target machine for the
src. Default is
no .
Currently
remote_src does not support recursive copying.
remote_src only works with
mode=preserve as of version 2.6.
|
selevel
-
|
Default:
"s0"
|
Level part of the SELinux file context. This is the MLS/MCS attribute, sometimes known as the
range .
_default feature works as for
seuser.
|
serole
-
|
Role part of SELinux file context,
_default feature works as for
seuser.
|
|
setype
-
|
Type part of SELinux file context,
_default feature works as for
seuser.
|
|
seuser
-
|
User part of SELinux file context. Will default to system policy, if applicable. If set to
_default , it will use the
user portion of the policy if available.
|
|
src
-
|
Local path to a file to copy to the remote server; can be absolute or relative. If path is a directory, it is copied recursively. In this case, if path ends with "/", only inside contents of that directory are copied to destination. Otherwise, if it does not end with "/", the directory itself with all contents is copied. This behavior is similar to Rsync.
|
|
unsafe_writes
boolean
added in 2.2
|
|
By default this module uses atomic operations to prevent data corruption or inconsistent reads from the target files, but sometimes systems are configured or just broken in ways that prevent this. One example is docker mounted files, which cannot be updated atomically from inside the container and can only be written in an unsafe manner.
This option allows Ansible to fall back to unsafe methods of updating files when atomic operations fail (however, it doesn't force Ansible to perform unsafe writes). IMPORTANT! Unsafe writes are subject to race conditions and can lead to data corruption.
|
validate
-
|
The validation command to run before copying into place. The path to the file to validate is passed in via '%s' which must be present as in the example below. The command is passed securely so shell features like expansion and pipes won't work.
|
Notes
Note
- The copy module recursively copy facility does not scale to lots (>hundreds) of files. For alternative, see synchronize module, which is a wrapper around
rsync
. - For Windows targets, use the win_copy module instead.
Examples
- name: example copying file with owner and permissions copy: src: /srv/myfiles/foo.conf dest: /etc/foo.conf owner: foo group: foo mode: 0644 - name: The same example as above, but using a symbolic mode equivalent to 0644 copy: src: /srv/myfiles/foo.conf dest: /etc/foo.conf owner: foo group: foo mode: u=rw,g=r,o=r - name: Another symbolic mode example, adding some permissions and removing others copy: src: /srv/myfiles/foo.conf dest: /etc/foo.conf owner: foo group: foo mode: u+rw,g-wx,o-rwx - name: Copy a new "ntp.conf file into place, backing up the original if it differs from the copied version copy: src: /mine/ntp.conf dest: /etc/ntp.conf owner: root group: root mode: 0644 backup: yes - name: Copy a new "sudoers" file into place, after passing validation with visudo copy: src: /mine/sudoers dest: /etc/sudoers validate: /usr/sbin/visudo -cf %s - name: Copy a "sudoers" file on the remote machine for editing copy: src: /etc/sudoers dest: /etc/sudoers.edit remote_src: yes validate: /usr/sbin/visudo -cf %s - name: Copy using the 'content' for inline data copy: content: '# This file was moved to /etc/other.conf' dest: /etc/mine.conf'
Return Values
Common return values are documented here, the following are the fields unique to this module:
Key | Returned | Description |
---|---|---|
backup_file
string
|
changed and if backup=yes |
name of backup file created
Sample:
/path/to/file.txt.2015-02-12@22:09~
|
checksum
string
|
success |
sha1 checksum of the file after running copy
Sample:
6e642bb8dd5c2e027bf21dd923337cbb4214f827
|
dest
string
|
success |
destination file/path
Sample:
/path/to/file.txt
|
gid
integer
|
success |
group id of the file, after execution
Sample:
100
|
group
string
|
success |
group of the file, after execution
Sample:
httpd
|
md5sum
string
|
when supported |
md5 checksum of the file after running copy
Sample:
2a5aeecc61dc98c4d780b14b330e3282
|
mode
string
|
success |
permissions of the target, after execution
Sample:
420
|
owner
string
|
success |
owner of the file, after execution
Sample:
httpd
|
size
integer
|
success |
size of the target, after execution
Sample:
1220
|
src
string
|
changed |
source file used for the copy on the target machine
Sample:
/home/httpd/.ansible/tmp/ansible-tmp-1423796390.97-147729857856000/source
|
state
string
|
success |
state of the target, after execution
Sample:
file
|
uid
integer
|
success |
owner id of the file, after execution
Sample:
100
|
Status
- This module is guaranteed to have no backward incompatible interface changes going forward. [stableinterface]
- This module is maintained by the Ansible Core Team. [core]
Red Hat Support
More information about Red Hat’s support of this module is available from this Red Hat Knowledge Base article.
Authors
- Ansible Core Team
- Michael DeHaan
Hint
If you notice any issues in this documentation you can edit this document to improve it.
© 2012–2018 Michael DeHaan
© 2018–2019 Red Hat, Inc.
Licensed under the GNU General Public License version 3.
https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/2.7/modules/copy_module.html