Create and access dict in Ansible playbook

Question

I'm trying to set a variable in an Ansible playbook based on an existing variable's value which could be one of many different strings. It's basically a case/switch statement and this is the logic (with incorrect syntax):

if {{ existing_ansible_var }} == "string1"
  new_ansible_var = "a"
else if {{ existing_ansible_var }} == "string2"
  new_ansible_var = "b"
<...>
else
  new_ansible_var = ""

I can use a pretty slick technique with a dictionary that looks like this in Jinja:

{% set new_ansible_var = {"string1": "a", "string2": "b"}[existing_ansible_var] | default("") -%}

Can I use a similar dictionary construct to set a variable (set_fact) in a playbook?

possible duplicate of [Case statement for setting var in Ansible/Jinja2](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/30637054/case-statement-for-setting-var-in-ansible-jinja2) — Bruce P, Jun 08 '15 at 19:51
You already asked virtually the same question [here](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/30637054/case-statement-for-setting-var-in-ansible-jinja2/30642550#30642550) four days ago and got a number of responses to that question. — Bruce P, Jun 08 '15 at 19:51

score 3 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 10:30

3

As described in the other question/answer, you can do it like this:

vars: 
   myDict: {"string1": "a", "string2": "b"}
   new_ansible_var: '{{myDict[existing_ansible_var | default("this key does not exist in the dict")] | default("") }}'

edited May 23 '17 at 10:30

Community

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answered Jun 09 '15 at 21:06

udondan

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Create and access dict in Ansible playbook

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