VyOS Platform Options

This page offers details on connection options to manage VyOS using Ansible.

Topics

• VyOS Platform Options
  • Connections Available
  • Using CLI in Ansible
    • Example CLI group_vars/vyos.yml
    • Example CLI Task

Connections Available

	CLI
Protocol	SSH
Credentials	uses SSH keys / SSH-agent if present accepts -u myuser -k if using password
Indirect Access	via a bastion (jump host)
Connection Settings	ansible_connection: network_cli
Enable Mode (Privilege Escalation)	not supported
Returned Data Format	Refer to individual module documentation

For legacy playbooks, VyOS still supports ansible_connection: local. We recommend modernizing to use ansible_connection: network_cli as soon as possible.

Using CLI in Ansible

Example CLI group_vars/vyos.yml

ansible_connection: network_cli
ansible_network_os: vyos
ansible_user: myuser
ansible_password: !vault...
ansible_ssh_common_args: '-o ProxyCommand="ssh -W %h:%p -q bastion01"'

• If you are using SSH keys (including an ssh-agent) you can remove the ansible_password configuration.
• If you are accessing your host directly (not through a bastion/jump host) you can remove the ansible_ssh_common_args configuration.
• If you are accessing your host through a bastion/jump host, you cannot include your SSH password in the ProxyCommand directive. To prevent secrets from leaking out (for example in ps output), SSH does not support providing passwords via environment variables.

Example CLI Task

- name: Retrieve VyOS version info
  vyos_command:
    commands: show version
  when: ansible_network_os == 'vyos'

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.