Change the User Primary Group on Linux with Ansible

By Luca Berton · Published 2024-01-01 · Category: troubleshooting

Learn how to use Ansible to change a user's primary group on Linux systems with the user module.

How to Change the User Primary Group on Linux with Ansible?

Ansible changes the User Primary Group on Linux

> ansible.builtin.user Manage user accounts

Today we're talking about Ansible module user. The full name is ansible.builtin.user, which means that is part of the collection of modules "builtin" with ansible and shipped with it. It's a module pretty stable and out for years, it manages user accounts. It supports a huge variety of Linux distributions, SunOS and macOS, and FreeBSD. For Windows, use the ansible.windows.win_user module instead.

Parameters

name _string_ - username
group _string_ - user's primary group (only one)
groups _list / elements=string_ - list of groups the user will be added to
append _boolean_ - no/yes - If yes, add the user to the groups specified in groups. If no, replace.

This module has many parameters, let me highlight the useful for our use case. The only required is "name", which is the username. The primary group is specified in the "group" parameter, every user need to be part of only one group. The "groups" parameter specifies the list of additional groups that the user will be added to. This type of group sometimes is called also "secondary", "additional" or "supplementary". The parameter "append" is very important. With the "yes" option, the user is going to be added to the specified groups. With the "no" option, all group members are going to be overwritten with the specified groups. So to Conclusion is you specify the "no" option you are going to lose all the previous group associations, please be careful!

Links

https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/latest/collections/ansible/builtin/user_module.html

## Playbook

How to change the User Primary Group on Linux with Ansible Playbook.

code

user_group_changeprimary.yml

---
- name: user module Playbook
  hosts: all
  become: true
  vars:
    myuser: "example"
    mygroup: "users"
  tasks:
    - name: change primary group
      ansible.builtin.user:
        name: "{{ myuser }}"
        group: "{{ mygroup }}"

execution

$ ansible-playbook -i virtualmachines/demo/inventory users_and_groups/user_group_changeprimary.yml
PLAY [user module Playbook] ***************************************************************************
TASK [Gathering Facts] ****************************************************************************
ok: [demo.example.com]
TASK [change primare group] ***********************************************************************
changed: [demo.example.com]
PLAY RECAP ****************************************************************************************
demo.example.com           : ok=2    changed=1    unreachable=0    failed=0    skipped=0    rescued=0    ignored=0
ansible-pilot $

before execution

$ ssh devops@demo.example.com
Last login: Wed Dec 15 13:00:47 2021 from 192.168.0.101
[devops@demo ~]$ sudo su
[root@demo devops]# cat /etc/os-release 
NAME="Red Hat Enterprise Linux"
VERSION="8.5 (Ootpa)"
ID="rhel"
ID_LIKE="fedora"
VERSION_ID="8.5"
PLATFORM_ID="platform:el8"
PRETTY_NAME="Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.5 (Ootpa)"
ANSI_COLOR="0;31"
CPE_NAME="cpe:/o:redhat:enterprise_linux:8::baseos"
HOME_URL="https://www.redhat.com/"
DOCUMENTATION_URL="https://access.redhat.com/documentation/red_hat_enterprise_linux/8/"
BUG_REPORT_URL="https://bugzilla.redhat.com/"
REDHAT_BUGZILLA_PRODUCT="Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8"
REDHAT_BUGZILLA_PRODUCT_VERSION=8.5
REDHAT_SUPPORT_PRODUCT="Red Hat Enterprise Linux"
REDHAT_SUPPORT_PRODUCT_VERSION="8.5"
[root@demo devops]# getent passwd | grep example
example:x:1002:1002:Ansible example:/home/example:/bin/bash
[root@demo devops]# id example
uid=1002(example) gid=1002(example) groups=1002(example),10(wheel)
[root@demo devops]# groups example
example : example wheel
[root@demo devops]#

after execution

$ ssh devops@demo.example.com
[devops@demo ~]$ sudo su
[root@demo devops]# getent passwd | grep example
example:x:1002:100:Ansible example:/home/example:/bin/bash
[root@demo devops]# id example
uid=1002(example) gid=100(users) groups=100(users),10(wheel)
[root@demo devops]# groups example
example : users wheel
[root@demo devops]#

code with ❤️ in GitHub

Conclusion

Now you know how to change the User Primary Group on Linux with Ansible.

Category: troubleshooting

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