I'm fairly new to Ansible and have been looking for a way to use it to help validate all my fcs devices are connected to the fabric.  So in looking at community.general.aix_devices and ibm.power_aix.devices I can see ways to rmdev, mkdev and change attributes, but what I'm hoping for, is a playbook that for each fcs device, validates it's connected to the fabric (fcstat) and if not, run a rmdev and mkdev on it.

Anyone have any pointers on where I can find something like that, that I can work off of?

I think we have to split this into smaller steps. First we have to gather data with the "setup" module or "gather_facts: true" in your playbook and maybe add some AIX specific data with the module "ibm.power_aix.mpio". When we have all the data we are able to automate the further steps with "ibm.power_aix.devices" when some fc-adapter is missing in your environment.

Just a small piece of code to give you an example of how to gather all the data you maybe need to evaluate the system state:

- hosts: all  gather_facts: true  become: true  tasks:    - name: Gather mpio data      ibm.power_aix.mpio:    - name: Show all the ansible facts      debug:        var: ansible_facts... some checks and maybe re-creation by using ibm.power_aix.devices ...

I'm fairly new to Ansible and have been looking for a way to use it to help validate all my fcs devices are connected to the fabric.  So in looking at community.general.aix_devices and ibm.power_aix.devices I can see ways to rmdev, mkdev and change attributes, but what I'm hoping for, is a playbook that for each fcs device, validates it's connected to the fabric (fcstat) and if not, run a rmdev and mkdev on it.

Anyone have any pointers on where I can find something like that, that I can work off of?

Thanks Niklas, however, the mpio module shows me information about disks paths, not the state of the HBA and if it's connected. Maybe I should clarify. This playbook would be run on a newly deployed system to help validate all the cabling is completed and shows connectivity. So simply, if the fcstat command returns anything, we are likely connected and if it errors out, we are not. Not sure if I've found a different command that will show link status.

ok: [aixtest01] => {
    "ansible_facts.mpio": {
        "drivers": {
            "2107DS8K": {
                "option": "NO_OVERRIDE",
                "options": [
                    "NO_OVERRIDE",
                    "AIX_AAPCM",
                    "AIX_non_MPIO"
   ...
        "paths": {
            "hdisk0": {
                "fscsi0": {
                    "5005076810115357,0": {
                        "path_id": 1,
                        "path_status": "Available",
                        "status": "Enabled"
                    },
                    "500507681011536e,0": {
                        "path_id": 0,
                        "path_status": "Available",
                        "status": "Enabled"
                    }
                },
   ...

I think we have to split this into smaller steps. First we have to gather data with the "setup" module or "gather_facts: true" in your playbook and maybe add some AIX specific data with the module "ibm.power_aix.mpio". When we have all the data we are able to automate the further steps with "ibm.power_aix.devices" when some fc-adapter is missing in your environment.

Just a small piece of code to give you an example of how to gather all the data you maybe need to evaluate the system state:

- hosts: all  gather_facts: true  become: true  tasks:    - name: Gather mpio data      ibm.power_aix.mpio:    - name: Show all the ansible facts      debug:        var: ansible_facts... some checks and maybe re-creation by using ibm.power_aix.devices ...

I'm fairly new to Ansible and have been looking for a way to use it to help validate all my fcs devices are connected to the fabric.  So in looking at community.general.aix_devices and ibm.power_aix.devices I can see ways to rmdev, mkdev and change attributes, but what I'm hoping for, is a playbook that for each fcs device, validates it's connected to the fabric (fcstat) and if not, run a rmdev and mkdev on it.

Anyone have any pointers on where I can find something like that, that I can work off of?

I think this is not covered by any existing AIX module and "ansible.builtin.shell" will help to execute your well-known AIX commands.

    - name: Gather fcstat data
      ansible.builtin.shell: fcstat fcs0
      changed_when: false
      register: fcstat_data

    - debug:
        var: fcstat_data

You can place any idea for new modules here as "Issue": GitHub - IBM/ansible-power-aix: Developer contributions for Ansible Automation on Power

Thanks Niklas, however, the mpio module shows me information about disks paths, not the state of the HBA and if it's connected. Maybe I should clarify. This playbook would be run on a newly deployed system to help validate all the cabling is completed and shows connectivity. So simply, if the fcstat command returns anything, we are likely connected and if it errors out, we are not. Not sure if I've found a different command that will show link status.

ok: [aixtest01] => {
    "ansible_facts.mpio": {
        "drivers": {
            "2107DS8K": {
                "option": "NO_OVERRIDE",
                "options": [
                    "NO_OVERRIDE",
                    "AIX_AAPCM",
                    "AIX_non_MPIO"
   ...
        "paths": {
            "hdisk0": {
                "fscsi0": {
                    "5005076810115357,0": {
                        "path_id": 1,
                        "path_status": "Available",
                        "status": "Enabled"
                    },
                    "500507681011536e,0": {
                        "path_id": 0,
                        "path_status": "Available",
                        "status": "Enabled"
                    }
                },
   ...

I think we have to split this into smaller steps. First we have to gather data with the "setup" module or "gather_facts: true" in your playbook and maybe add some AIX specific data with the module "ibm.power_aix.mpio". When we have all the data we are able to automate the further steps with "ibm.power_aix.devices" when some fc-adapter is missing in your environment.

Just a small piece of code to give you an example of how to gather all the data you maybe need to evaluate the system state:

- hosts: all  gather_facts: true  become: true  tasks:    - name: Gather mpio data      ibm.power_aix.mpio:    - name: Show all the ansible facts      debug:        var: ansible_facts... some checks and maybe re-creation by using ibm.power_aix.devices ...

I'm fairly new to Ansible and have been looking for a way to use it to help validate all my fcs devices are connected to the fabric.  So in looking at community.general.aix_devices and ibm.power_aix.devices I can see ways to rmdev, mkdev and change attributes, but what I'm hoping for, is a playbook that for each fcs device, validates it's connected to the fabric (fcstat) and if not, run a rmdev and mkdev on it.

Anyone have any pointers on where I can find something like that, that I can work off of?

I'm fairly new to Ansible and have been looking for a way to use it to help validate all my fcs devices are connected to the fabric.  So in looking at community.general.aix_devices and ibm.power_aix.devices I can see ways to rmdev, mkdev and change attributes, but what I'm hoping for, is a playbook that for each fcs device, validates it's connected to the fabric (fcstat) and if not, run a rmdev and mkdev on it.

Anyone have any pointers on where I can find something like that, that I can work off of?

I'm fairly new to Ansible and have been looking for a way to use it to help validate all my fcs devices are connected to the fabric.  So in looking at community.general.aix_devices and ibm.power_aix.devices I can see ways to rmdev, mkdev and change attributes, but what I'm hoping for, is a playbook that for each fcs device, validates it's connected to the fabric (fcstat) and if not, run a rmdev and mkdev on it.

Anyone have any pointers on where I can find something like that, that I can work off of?

Hi Mark,

I agree with José - I don't think rmdev/mkdev is what you want. If you don't want to wait for cfgmgr, you can run it with just one device and it will search for all child devices of it.

But as a starting point:

---- name: Test FC HBA and fail if it is not connected  hosts: all  become: true  gather_facts: false    tasks:    - name: Get devices information      ansible.builtin.setup:        gather_subset:           - devices    - name: Get fscsi devices      ansible.builtin.set_fact:        fscsi_dev: "{{ ansible_facts.devices | ansible.builtin.dict2items | community.general.json_query(q) }}"      vars:        q: "[?contains(value.type, 'FC SCSI I/O Controller Protocol Device')].{ name: key, attach: value.attributes.attach, scsi_id: value.attributes.scsi_id }"    - name: Get parents for fscsi devices      ansible.builtin.command:        cmd: "lsdev -l {{ item.name }} -F parent"      register: parent_output      loop: "{{ fscsi_dev }}"      loop_control:        label: "Getting parent device of {{ item.name }}"      changed_when: false    - name: Joining information      ansible.builtin.set_fact:        fscsi: "{{ fscsi | default([]) + [{ 'name': item.name, 'attach': item.attach, 'scsi_id': item.scsi_id, 'parent': parent_output.results[idx].stdout }] }}"      loop: "{{ fscsi_dev }}"      loop_control:        label: "Adding parent device to {{ item.name }}"        index_var: idx    - name: Removing devices if scsi_id is undefined or attach is not switch      ansible.builtin.command:        cmd: "rmdev -Rl {{ item.parent }}"      loop: "{{ fscsi }}"      loop_control:        label: "Removing {{ item.parent }}"      when: item.attach != 'switch' or item.scsi_id == ''    - name: Recreating removed devices      ansible.builtin.command:        cmd: "cfgmgr -l {{ item.parent }}"      loop: "{{ fscsi }}"      loop_control:        label: "Recreating {{ item.parent }}"      when: item.attach != 'switch' or item.scsi_id == ''    - name: Re-gather devices information      ansible.builtin.setup:        gather_subset:           - devices    - name: Re-get fscsi devices      ansible.builtin.set_fact:        fscsi_dev: "{{ ansible_facts.devices | ansible.builtin.dict2items | community.general.json_query(q) }}"      vars:        q: "[?contains(value.type, 'FC SCSI I/O Controller Protocol Device')].{ name: key, attach: value.attributes.attach, scsi_id: value.attributes.scsi_id }"    - name: Fail if there are still devices without connection      ansible.builtin.fail:        msg: "The device {{ item.name }} has wrong value for attach ({{ item.attach }}) or scsi_id ({{ item.scsi_id }})"      loop: "{{ fscsi_dev }}"      loop_control:        label: "Checking {{ item.name }}"      when: item.attach != 'switch' or item.scsi_id == ''

I'm fairly new to Ansible and have been looking for a way to use it to help validate all my fcs devices are connected to the fabric.  So in looking at community.general.aix_devices and ibm.power_aix.devices I can see ways to rmdev, mkdev and change attributes, but what I'm hoping for, is a playbook that for each fcs device, validates it's connected to the fabric (fcstat) and if not, run a rmdev and mkdev on it.

Anyone have any pointers on where I can find something like that, that I can work off of?