Check if a directory exists - Ansible module stat

Deep dive into the Ansible module stat of the collection ansible.builtin to test if a specified path is a directory and print a message. Live demo and Ansible playbook included.

July 29, 2021

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How to check if a directory exists in Ansible?

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 check directory exists

Today we’re talking about the Ansible module stat. The full name is ansible.builtin.stat, 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 works in a different variety of operating systems. It retrieves a file entry or a file system status. For Windows target use the ansible.windows.win_stat module instead.

Main parameters and return values

path string

The only mandatory parameter is “path” which is the filesystem full path of the object to check.

stat complex

The module returns a complex object, the property that is interesting for us is “isdir”. This attribute is “true” if the object is a directory.

Demo

Let’s jump in a real-life playbook to check if a directory exists with Ansible.

code

directory_check_exists.yml

---
- name: check if the directory exists
  hosts: all
  become: false
  vars:
    directory: "/tmp"
  tasks:
    - name: Check if the directory exists
      ansible.builtin.stat:
        path: "{{ directory }}"
      register: dir_to_check

    - name: Directory found
      ansible.builtin.debug:
        msg: "Directory {{ directory }} present"
      when: dir_to_check.stat.isdir is defined and dir_to_check.stat.isdir

code with ❤️ in GitHub

Recap

Now you know better the Ansible module stat and you could use it successfully in your playbook. Subscribe to the YouTube channel, Medium, Website, Twitter, and Substack to not miss the next episode of the Ansible Pilot.