Remove a local user on Windows-like systems - Ansible module win_user

How to automate the removal of a local user “example” on Windows-like systems using the Ansible module win_user.

March 23, 2022

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#ansible #user #module #user-management #accounting #authorization #authentication #windows

How to Remove a local user on Windows-like systems with Ansible?

I’m going to show you a live demo with some simple Ansible code. I’m Luca Berton and welcome to today’s episode of Ansible Pilot.

Ansible remove local user account

ansible.windows.win_user
Manages local Windows user accounts

Today we’re talking about Ansible module win_user. The full name is ansible.windows.win_user, 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. It works in Windows and Windows Server operating systems. It manages local Windows user accounts. For Linux target use the user module instead.

Parameters

name string - user name
state string - present/absent

The only required is “name”, which is the user name. The “state” parameter allows us to create or delete a user. For our use case, we need to use the “absent” option.

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demo

How to Remove a local user on Windows-like systems with Ansible Playbook. I’m going to show you how to automate the deletion of the “example” user on my demo Windows machine.

code

---
- name: windows user remove
  hosts: all
  vars:
    usr_name: 'example'
  tasks:
    - name: delete local user
      ansible.windows.win_user:
        name: "{{ usr_name }}"
        state: absent

execution

ansible-pilot $ ansible-playbook -i virtualmachines/win/inventory windows/user_remove.yml
PLAY [windows user remove] ************************************************************************
TASK [Gathering Facts] ****************************************************************************
ok: [WindowsServer]
TASK [delete local user] **************************************************************************
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/user_remove.yml
PLAY [windows user remove] ************************************************************************
TASK [Gathering Facts] ****************************************************************************
ok: [WindowsServer]
TASK [delete local user] **************************************************************************
ok: [WindowsServer]
PLAY RECAP ****************************************************************************************
WindowsServer              : ok=2    changed=0    unreachable=0    failed=0    skipped=0    rescued=0    ignored=0
ansible-pilot $

before execution

win_user before execution

after execution

win_user after execution

code with ❤️ in GitHub

Recap

Now you know how to Remove a local user on Windows-like systems with Ansible. Subscribe to the YouTube channel, Medium, and Website, X (formerly Twitter) to not miss the next episode of the Ansible Pilot.