5.2 KiB
JinjaTurtle
JinjaTurtle is a command-line tool to help you generate Jinja2 templates and Ansible inventory from a native configuration file (or files) of a piece of software.
How it works
- The config file(s) is/are examined
- Parameter key names are generated based on the parameter names in the config file. In keeping with Ansible best practices, you pass a prefix for the key names, which should typically match the name of your Ansible role.
- A Jinja2 file is generated from the file with those parameter key names
injected as the
{{ variable }}names. - An Ansible inventory YAML file is generated with those key names and the values taken from the original config file as the default vars.
By default, the Jinja2 template and the Ansible inventory are printed to stdout. However, it is possible to output the results to new files.
What sort of config files can it handle?
TOML, YAML, INI, JSON and XML-style config files should be okay. There are always going to be some edge cases in very complex files that are difficult to work with, though, so you may still find that you need to tweak the results.
For XML and YAML files, JinjaTurtle will attempt to generate 'for' loops and lists in the Ansible yaml if the config file looks homogenous enough to support it. However, if it lacks the confidence in this, it will fall back to using scalar-style flattened attributes.
You may need or wish to tidy up the config to suit your needs.
The goal here is really to speed up converting files into Ansible/Jinja2, but not necessarily to make it perfect.
Can I convert multiple files at once?
Certainly! Pass the folder name instead of a specific file name, and JinjaTurtle will convert any files it understands in that folder, storing all the various vars in the destination defaults yaml file, and converting each file into a Jinja2 template per file type.
If all the files had the same 'type', there'll be one Jinja2 template.
You can also pass --recursive to recurse into subfolders.
Note: when using 'folder' mode and multiple files of the same type, their vars
will be listed under an 'items' parent key in the yaml, each with an id key.
You'll then want to use a loop in Ansible later, e.g:
- name: Render configs
template:
src: config.j2
dest: "/somewhere/{{ item.id }}"
loop: "{{ myrole_items }}"
How to install it
Ubuntu/Debian apt repository
sudo mkdir -p /usr/share/keyrings
curl -fsSL https://mig5.net/static/mig5.asc | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/mig5.gpg
echo "deb [arch=amd64 signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/mig5.gpg] https://apt.mig5.net $(lsb_release -cs) main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mig5.list
sudo apt update
sudo apt install jinjaturtle
Fedora
sudo rpm --import https://mig5.net/static/mig5.asc
sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/mig5.repo > /dev/null << 'EOF'
[mig5]
name=mig5 Repository
baseurl=https://rpm.mig5.net/$releasever/rpm/$basearch
enabled=1
gpgcheck=1
repo_gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=https://mig5.net/static/mig5.asc
EOF
sudo dnf upgrade --refresh
sudo dnf install jinjaturtle
From PyPi
pip install jinjaturtle
From this git repository
Clone the repo and then run inside the clone:
poetry install
AppImage
Download the AppImage from the Releases and make it executable, and put it
on your $PATH.
How to run it
Say you have a php.ini file and you are in a directory structure like an
Ansible role (with subfolders defaults and templates):
jinjaturtle php.ini \
--role-name php \
--defaults-output defaults/main.yml \
--template-output templates/php.ini.j2
Full usage info
usage: jinjaturtle [-h] -r ROLE_NAME [-f {json,ini,toml,yaml,xml,postfix,systemd}] [-d DEFAULTS_OUTPUT] [-t TEMPLATE_OUTPUT] config
Convert a config file into Ansible inventory and a Jinja2 template.
positional arguments:
config Path to the source configuration file.
options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
-r, --role-name ROLE_NAME
Ansible role name, used as variable prefix (e.g. cometbft).
-f, --format {ini,json,toml,xml}
Force config format instead of auto-detecting from filename.
-d, --defaults-output DEFAULTS_OUTPUT
Path to write defaults/main.yml. If omitted, default vars are printed to stdout.
-t, --template-output TEMPLATE_OUTPUT
Path to write the Jinja2 config template. If omitted, template is printed to stdout.
Additional supported formats
JinjaTurtle can also template some common "bespoke" config formats:
- Postfix main.cf (
main.cf) →--format postfix - systemd unit files (
*.service,*.socket, etc.) →--format systemd
For ambiguous extensions like *.conf, JinjaTurtle uses lightweight content sniffing; you can always force a specific handler via --format.
Found a bug, have a suggestion?
You can e-mail me (see the pyproject.toml for details) or contact me on the Fediverse: