Ansible Dynamic Inventory fails to get the latest ec2 information

Question

I am using ec2.py dynamic inventory for provisioning with ansible. I have placed the ec2.py in /etc/ansible/hosts file and marked it executable. I also have the ec2.ini file in /etc/ansible/hosts.

[ec2]

regions = us-west-2
regions_exclude = us-gov-west-1,cn-north-1


destination_variable = public_dns_name

vpc_destination_variable = ip_address
route53 = False

all_instances = True
all_rds_instances = False


cache_path = ~/.ansible/tmp

cache_max_age = 0

nested_groups = False
group_by_instance_id = True
group_by_region = True
group_by_availability_zone = True
group_by_ami_id = True
group_by_instance_type = True
group_by_key_pair = True
group_by_vpc_id = True
group_by_security_group = True
group_by_tag_keys = True
group_by_tag_none = True
group_by_route53_names = True
group_by_rds_engine = True
group_by_rds_parameter_group = True

Above is my ec2.ini file

---
- hosts: localhost
  connection: local
  gather_facts: yes
  vars_files:
   - ../group_vars/dev_vpc
   - ../group_vars/dev_sg
   - ../hosts_vars/ec2_info
  vars:
    instance_type: t2.micro
  tasks:
   - name: Provisioning EC2 instance
     local_action:
     module: ec2
     region: "{{ region }}"
     key_name: "{{ key }}"
     instance_type: "{{ instance_type }}"
     image: "{{ ami_id }}"
     wait: yes
     group_id: ["{{ sg_npm }}", "{{sg_ssh}}"]
     vpc_subnet_id: "{{ PublicSubnet }}"
     source_dest_check: false
     instance_tags: '{"Name": "EC2", "Environment": "Development"}'
 register: ec2
  - name: associate new EIP for the instance
    local_action:
      module: ec2_eip
      region: "{{ region }}"
      instance_id: "{{ item.id }}"
      with_items: ec2.instances
  - name: Waiting for NPM Server to come-up
    local_action:
      module: wait_for
      host: "{{ ec2 }}"
      state: started
      delay: 5
      timeout: 200
 - include: ec2-configure.yml

Now the configuring script is as follows

- name: Configure EC2 server
  hosts: tag_Name_EC2
  user: ec2-user
  sudo: True
  gather_facts: True
  tasks:
   - name: Install nodejs related packages
     yum: name={{ item }} enablerepo=epel state=present
     with_items:
      - nodejs
      - npm

However when the configure script is called, the second script results into no hosts found. If I execute the ec2-configure.yml just alone and if the EC2 server is up & running then it is able to find it and configure it.

I added the wait_for to make sure that the instance is in running state before the ec2-configure.yml is called.

Would appreciate if anyone can point my error. Thanks

Answer 1

After researching I came to know that the dynamic inventory doesnt refresh between playbook calls, it will only refresh if you are executing the playbook seprately. However I was able to resolve the issue by using add_host command.

- name: Add  Server to inventory
  local_action: add_host hostname={{ item.public_ip }} groupname=webserver
  with_items: webserver.instances