Introduction

AAP 2.6 introduces a significant quality-of-life improvement: standardized environment variable naming across all platform components. Collections now use a unified AAP_ prefix instead of component-specific prefixes.

What Changed

Before AAP 2.6

Each component had its own variable naming convention:

``bash

Automation Controller

CONTROLLER_HOST=controller.example.com

CONTROLLER_USERNAME=admin

CONTROLLER_PASSWORD=secret

CONTROLLER_VERIFY_SSL=true

Automation Hub

AH_HOST=hub.example.com

AH_USERNAME=admin

AH_TOKEN=my-token

Event-Driven Ansible

EDA_HOST=eda.example.com

EDA_USERNAME=admin

`

After AAP 2.6

A single, unified naming convention:

`bash

All components use AAP_ prefix

AAP_HOST=gateway.example.com

AAP_USERNAME=admin

AAP_PASSWORD=secret

AAP_VERIFY_SSL=true

`

Module Variable Changes

Collections also standardize module-level variables:

`yaml

Before (component-specific)

  • name: Create job template

ansible.controller.job_template:

controller_host: "{{ controller_host }}"

controller_username: "{{ controller_user }}"

name: "Deploy App"

After (unified)

  • name: Create job template

ansible.platform.job_template:

aap_host: "{{ aap_host }}"

aap_username: "{{ aap_user }}"

name: "Deploy App"

`

Migration Steps

Step 1: Identify Current Variables

Search your playbooks and environment for component-specific variables:

`bash

grep -r "CONTROLLER_\|AH_\|EDA_" /path/to/playbooks/

grep -r "controller_host\|ah_host\|eda_host" /path/to/playbooks/

`

Step 2: Update Environment Variables

Update your CI/CD pipelines, environment files, and vault entries:

`bash

Update .env files

sed -i 's/CONTROLLER_HOST/AAP_HOST/g' .env

sed -i 's/CONTROLLER_USERNAME/AAP_USERNAME/g' .env

sed -i 's/CONTROLLER_PASSWORD/AAP_PASSWORD/g' .env

`

Step 3: Update Playbooks

Replace component-specific module calls with the ansible.platform` collection.

Step 4: Test

Verify all automation works with the new variable names before deploying to production.

Backward Compatibility

The old variable names may still work in AAP 2.6 for backward compatibility, but they are deprecated and will be removed in a future release. Migrate now to avoid issues later.

Conclusion

Standardized environment variables simplify configuration management and reduce confusion when working across platform components. Update your configurations now to benefit from the unified naming convention.

For more Ansible tutorials and guides, explore the [complete article collection](/articles) on Ansible Pilot.