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Inventory

Overview

The MiniPaaS Ansible role (minipaas-role/) uses a simple inventory layout.
Hosts are grouped as managers or workers, and optional variables can be defined through group_vars, host_vars, or inline in the inventory.

Only four configuration variables exist:

  • docker_tls_dir
  • minipaas_extra_ports
  • monitoring_telegram_token
  • monitoring_telegram_chat_id

This keeps the provisioning layer small, predictable, and easy to maintain.

Basic Inventory Structure

A minimal inventory.ini:

[managers]
manager1 ansible_host=1.2.3.4

[workers]
worker1 ansible_host=1.2.3.5
````

The role installs Docker, configures the system, and performs `swarm init` or `swarm join` depending on the group.

---

## Group Variables

Group variables apply to all hosts in a group.
Examples:

### `group_vars/managers.yml`

```yaml
minipaas_extra_ports:
  - 443

group_vars/workers.yml

minipaas_extra_ports:
  - 3000

Host Variables

Use host_vars/<hostname>.yml to configure specific hosts.

Example: enabling Docker API TLS only on the manager:

docker_tls_dir: "./certs"

Or enabling Telegram alerts on a specific node:

monitoring_telegram_token: "123:ABC"
monitoring_telegram_chat_id: "999111222"

Inline Variables in the Inventory

For small setups, variables can be set directly in inventory.ini:

[managers]
manager1 ansible_host=1.2.3.4 docker_tls_dir=./certs

[workers]
worker1 ansible_host=1.2.3.5 minipaas_extra_ports="[3000]"

Inline variables override defaults and group vars.

inventory.ini
group_vars/
  managers.yml
  workers.yml
host_vars/
  manager1.yml
  worker1.yml

This approach keeps configurations organized and easy to scale.

Summary

Your inventory defines:

  • which hosts are managers
  • which hosts are workers
  • optional TLS settings
  • optional firewall ports
  • optional monitoring/alerting configuration

All other provisioning behavior is automatic and requires no additional settings.