Testing Ansible Code with Molecule

5. Writing the converge play

The converge play is a regular playbook, and you will specify in the molecule.yml a reference to your playbook when it’s a test target.

# molecule.yml (fragment)
provisioner:
  name: ansible
  playbooks:
    converge: ../../apache1_debian.yml

If you prefer to write your own play, create a converge.yml file in the test scenario directory. Example of such configuration is provided in the apache4_with_role test scenario.

# converge.yml
---
- name: Install Apache on RedHat and Debian systems (role)
  hosts: webservers
  become: true
  roles:
    - apache

Notice that in case of writing a converge.yml play you need to take care of roles to be available for Ansible. One technique to configure the right directory is to set ENV in the provisioner stage configuration. MOLECULE_PROJECT_DIRECTORY contains the path level for the tested component. In case of playbooks, it’s the repo root directory; it will be a little different for role components.

# molecule.yml (fragment)
provisioner:
  name: ansible
  env:
    ANSIBLE_ROLES_PATH: "${MOLECULE_PROJECT_DIRECTORY}/roles"

For clarity, I’ll show the converge.yml for a play using collections. It’s the same as a role with a change in fully qualified role name, which now is explicitly taken from the myorg.unix namespace.

# converge.yml
---
- name: Install Apache on RedHat and Debian systems (collection)
  hosts: webservers
  become: true
  roles:
    - myorg.unix.apache

Notice requirements.yml in the test scenario directory. This file is processed by the dependency stage to install all required collections.

# requirements.yml
---
collections:
  - name: collections/ansible_collections/myorg/unix/
    type: dir

The dependency stage is configured to use the requirements.yml file by the molecule.yml directive.

# molecule.yml (fragment)
dependency:
  name: galaxy
  options:
    requirements-file: requirements.yml

At this stage, you understand how to prepare Molecule tests for a standalone play, play with role, and a play using a collection executing in a Podman-controlled environment. Let’s take a closer look at the assertion play.