Add Windows Registry on Windows-like systems - Ansible module win_regedit

How to automate the creation of the Windows Registry key “name” and “value” under a specified “path” on Windows-like systems with Ansible Playbook using win_regedit module.

March 17, 2022

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#ansible #registry #module #windows #windows-server #regedit

How to Add Windows Registry key-value on Windows-like systems with Ansible?

Changing registry values manually can be time-consuming and error-prone. Ansible includes built-in capabilities for managing individual key-value pairs in an idempotent way. I’m going to show you a live demo and some simple Ansible code. I’m Luca Berton and welcome to today’s episode of Ansible Pilot

Ansible adds Windows Registry on Windows-like systems

ansible.windows.win_regedit
Get information about Windows registry keys

Let’s talk about the Ansible module win_regedit. The full name is ansible.windows.win_regedit, which means that is part of the collection of modules specialized to interact with Windows target host. It’s a module pretty stable and out for years and it works in Windows and Windows Server operating systems. It adds, changes, or remove registry keys and values.

Parameters

path string - The full registry key path including the hive to search for
name string - Name of the registry entry in the path parameters.
type string - string / none / binary / dword / expandstring / multistring / qword
data string - Value of the registry entry
state string - present / absent

The only mandatory parameter is “path” which is the full registry key path including the hive to search for. Almost mandatory is also the “name” of the name of the registry entry in the path parameters. Another important parameter is the “type” specify the datatype of the value: string, dword, qword, binary, multistring, etc. Some values could either be represented as a decimal number or a hex value. Multi-string values should be passed in as a list. Refer to the module manual for more details and examples. Finally, we could specify the value of the registry entry in the “data” parameter. Another useful parameter is the “state” to specify if we would like to add or modify (“present” option) or remove (“absent” option).

demo

How to Add Windows Registry on Windows-like systems accessing the Windows Registry with Ansible Playbook.

Specifically, I’m going to create a Windows Registry key located in “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Test”.

code

---
- name: windows registry add
  hosts: all
  vars:
    mypath: 'HKLM:\Software\Test'
    mykey: 'hello'
    mytype: string
    myvalue: 'world'
  tasks:
    - name: registry add key-value
      ansible.windows.win_regedit:
        path: "{{ mypath }}"
        name: "{{ mykey }}"
        type: "{{ mytype }}"
        data: "{{ myvalue }}"

execution

ansible-pilot $ ansible-playbook -i virtualmachines/win/inventory windows/registry_add.yml
PLAY [windows registry add] ***********************************************************************
TASK [Gathering Facts] ****************************************************************************
ok: [WindowsServer]
TASK [registry add key-value] *********************************************************************
changed: [WindowsServer]
PLAY RECAP ****************************************************************************************
WindowsServer              : ok=2    changed=1    unreachable=0    failed=0    skipped=0    rescued=0    ignored=0
ansible-pilot $

idempotency

ansible-pilot $ ansible-playbook -i virtualmachines/win/inventory windows/registry_add.yml
PLAY [windows registry add] ***********************************************************************
TASK [Gathering Facts] ****************************************************************************
ok: [WindowsServer]
TASK [registry add key-value] *********************************************************************
ok: [WindowsServer]
PLAY RECAP ****************************************************************************************
WindowsServer              : ok=2    changed=0    unreachable=0    failed=0    skipped=0    rescued=0    ignored=0
ansible-pilot $