EX294 Implement advanced Ansible automation Practice Test 4 — 15 Questions

Question 1

An Ansible playbook contains many tasks. An administrator wants to run only a subset of tasks by passing '--tags ' at the command line. Which of the following must be added to the tasks?

Accepted Answer

a 'tags' directive on each task. The 'tags' directive is the only mechanism in Ansible that allows tasks to be selectively included or excluded when running a playbook with the '--tags' command-line option. By adding a 'tags' attribute to a task (e.g., 'tags: install'), the administrator can target that task specifically, and Ansible's task execution engine filters tasks based on the provided tags at runtime.

Answer

a 'name' with specific naming convention

Answer

a 'block' statement

Answer

a 'when' condition

Question 2

A role contains a handler. The playbook includes the role and also defines a task that notifies the same handler. When the playbook runs, the handler executes only once. Which of the following best explains this behavior?

Accepted Answer

handlers are deduplicated by name; multiple notifications trigger the handler only once per play. Ansible handlers are deduplicated by name within a play. When a handler is notified multiple times—whether from a role or a playbook task—it runs only once at the end of the play, after all tasks have completed. This prevents redundant executions and is a core design feature of Ansible's handler system.

Answer

the handler was already triggered by the role and is skipped for the play task

Answer

the role's handler uses 'listen' which overrides notifications

Answer

the playbook's task notifies a different handler with the same name

Question 3

An Ansible playbook uses the 'constructed' inventory plugin with 'keyed_groups' to create groups based on 'ansible_distribution'. Despite correct configuration, hosts are not assigned to the expected groups. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

the 'strict' option is set to 'yes' and the required facts are not gathered. 'strict: yes' causes plugin to fail on undefined variables; if facts are not gathered, 'ansible_distribution' is undefined. Options A, B, D are plausible but less likely.

Answer

the 'keyed_groups' syntax uses invalid Jinja2 expressions

Answer

the inventory file is incorrectly formatted

Answer

the plugin is not enabled in ansible.cfg

Question 4

An Ansible playbook uses a 'block' to group multiple tasks and includes a 'rescue' section. If a task inside the block fails, what will happen?

Accepted Answer

the rescue section runs, and the playbook continues with tasks after the block. In Ansible, a 'block' groups tasks, and a 'rescue' section defines tasks to run if any task in the block fails. When a task inside the block fails, the rescue section executes, and then the playbook continues with the next task after the block. Option C correctly describes this behavior. Option A is incorrect because the rescue does run, but the playbook continues after the block, not just with the next task. Option B is incorrect because the block is not re-executed. Option D is incorrect because the playbook does not stop; it continues after the rescue.

Answer

the rescue section runs and then the playbook resumes with the next task after the block

Answer

the block is re-executed from the beginning

Answer

the playbook stops immediately

Question 5

An Ansible playbook sets a variable with a dictionary value in the play's vars and also in group_vars/all. When the play runs, the dictionary in group_vars completely replaces the one in play vars. What is the most likely reason?

Accepted Answer

Ansible's default variable precedence uses replacement, not merging, for dictionaries. Ansible's default variable precedence treats dictionaries as atomic values: when a dictionary variable is defined at a higher precedence level (like group_vars), it completely replaces the same variable defined at a lower precedence level (like play vars). Ansible does not merge dictionaries by default; the `hash_behaviour` setting, which controls merging, defaults to `replace`. Option A is incorrect because `set_fact` has a higher precedence than group_vars, but the question describes group_vars replacing play vars, which is normal precedence behavior, not set_fact. Option B is incorrect because YAML syntax is not the issue; even with correct syntax, replacement occurs. Option C is incorrect because the same variable name is used, leading to replacement rather than merging.

Answer

the playbook uses 'set_fact' which overrides all other vars

Answer

the play vars dictionary is defined with incorrect YAML syntax

Answer

the group_vars file uses a different variable name

Question 6

An Ansible playbook uses delegation to run a task on localhost while targeting remote hosts. The task fails with 'connection refused' for the remote host. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

the task uses 'connection: local' incorrectly or omits it. 'delegate_to: localhost' runs the task locally, but the connection keyword 'ansible_connection' may still refer to remote if not set correctly. Option A is plausible but less common. Options C and D are incorrect.

Answer

the remote host is not reachable from the control node

Answer

the playbook lacks 'gather_facts: yes'

Answer

the delegate host lacks required Python libraries

Question 7

Which TWO of the following are valid methods to include external variable files into an Ansible playbook?

Accepted Answer

using the 'include_vars' module. The 'include_vars' module dynamically loads variables from external files into a playbook at runtime, allowing for conditional or loop-based variable inclusion. Option E is correct because the 'vars_files' directive statically specifies external variable files to be parsed before task execution, a standard method for separating variable data from play logic.

Answer

using the 'add_host' module

Answer

using the 'set_fact' module

Answer

using '-e' command line option

Question 8

Which THREE of the following are valid attributes of the ansible.builtin.service module?

Accepted Answer

state. The `state` attribute is a core parameter of the `ansible.builtin.service` module, used to define the desired service status (e.g., `started`, `stopped`, `restarted`, `reloaded`). This directly controls the service's runtime state on the target system.

Answer

pattern

Answer

runlevel

Question 9

Which TWO of the following are correct about Ansible Vault?

Accepted Answer

the vault password can be provided via the '--vault-password-file' option. The `--vault-password-file` option allows Ansible to read the vault password from a file, which is a standard method for providing the password non-interactively, especially in automation scripts or CI/CD pipelines. This avoids the need for manual password entry and supports secure password management.

Answer

vault encryption is irreversible

Answer

vault encrypted files cannot be edited in place

Answer

vault can encrypt only specific variable values within a file

Question 10

Refer to the exhibit. An administrator wants to view the decrypted value of 'db_password' without modifying the file. Which command should be used?

Accepted Answer

ansible-vault view file.yml. The `ansible-vault view` command decrypts the file in memory and displays its contents to stdout without modifying the encrypted file on disk. This is the correct choice because the administrator only needs to see the decrypted value of 'db_password' and does not want to change the file.

Answer

ansible-vault rekey file.yml

Answer

ansible-vault decrypt file.yml

Answer

ansible-vault edit file.yml

Question 11

Refer to the exhibit. An Ansible playbook targeting 'production' hosts fails with 'deploy_user is undefined'. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

the variable 'deploy_user' is not defined in any group or host vars. The error 'deploy_user is undefined' indicates that Ansible cannot find a value for the variable 'deploy_user' in any of the variable sources it searches. In Ansible, variables are resolved from group vars, host vars, play vars, and other sources with a specific precedence order. If the variable is not defined in any group or host vars file, nor in the inventory itself, Ansible will fail with an 'undefined variable' error. The exhibit shows a play targeting 'production' hosts, so the most likely cause is that no group or host var file defines 'deploy_user' for that group or its hosts.

Answer

the playbook uses a different group name in the play

Answer

the inventory file is missing the host entries

Answer

the variable is defined but overridden by a higher precedence variable

Question 12

An Ansible playbook uses the lineinfile module to ensure a specific line is present in a configuration file. However, after running the playbook multiple times, the line is duplicated each time. Which option best explains this behavior?

Accepted Answer

The lineinfile module is missing the regexp parameter, so it adds the line every run.. The lineinfile module without a regexp parameter cannot identify an existing line to match, so it adds the line every time the playbook runs, causing duplicates. Option B is incorrect because 'append' is not a valid state for lineinfile; valid states are 'present' (default) and 'absent'. Option C is incorrect because the backup parameter only creates a backup file and does not affect line duplication. Option D is incorrect because insertafter=EOF would place the line at the end of the file, but without a regexp, the module still cannot detect an existing matching line and will add it each run.

Answer

The state parameter is set to 'append' instead of 'present'.

Answer

The backup parameter is not set, causing file corruption.

Answer

The insertafter parameter is incorrectly set to EOF, causing multiple adds.

Question 13

An automation engineer wants to run a playbook only on hosts that belong to both the 'webservers' group and the 'production' group. Which inventory grouping method achieves this?

Accepted Answer

webservers:&production. In Ansible, the '&' operator is used to intersect groups. 'webservers:&production' targets hosts that are in both the 'webservers' and 'production' groups. Option B is wrong because 'webservers:production' uses ':' which is a union operator, meaning hosts in either group. Option C is wrong because 'webservers:!production' uses '!' to exclude hosts in production. Option D is wrong because 'webservers+,production' is not a valid inventory pattern; Ansible does not support '+' for group intersection.

Answer

webservers:production

Answer

webservers:!production

Answer

webservers+,production

Question 14

A playbook uses the copy module to deploy a configuration file. The file should be templated with variables, but the engineer mistakenly uses the 'src' parameter with a static file instead of 'content' or a template module. What is the most likely outcome?

Accepted Answer

The file is copied without variable substitution, resulting in literal Jinja2 syntax in the destination.. The copy module with the 'src' parameter copies a file without any processing of Jinja2 templates. It does not perform variable substitution. Therefore, if the source file contains Jinja2 syntax (e.g., {{ variable }}), it will be copied literally to the destination. The correct answer is B. Option A is incorrect because the copy module does not automatically render templates. Option C is incorrect because the playbook will not fail due to undefined variables; it simply copies the file as-is. Option D is incorrect because the task will execute and copy the file, not skip.

Answer

The module automatically renders the Jinja2 template before copying.

Answer

The playbook fails because the source file contains undefined variables.

Answer

The task is skipped because copy cannot handle variables.

Question 15

An organization uses separate network hops that require different SSH usernames for different inventory groups. Which Ansible configuration approach ensures each group uses the correct SSH user without duplicating playbooks?

Accepted Answer

Create a group_vars directory with a file named after the group containing ansible_user.. Creating a group_vars directory with a file named after a group and setting ansible_user inside it is the best practice for assigning different SSH users per group without duplicating playbooks. Option B is incorrect because specifying the SSH user in the inventory file for each host is possible but less scalable and harder to maintain. Option C is incorrect because setting ansible_user in ansible.cfg applies globally to all hosts, not per group. Option D is incorrect because defining ansible_user in the playbook using vars would require editing the playbook for each group, which leads to duplication and is not scalable.

Answer

Specify the SSH user in the inventory file for each host.

Answer

Set the ansible_user variable in ansible.cfg.

Answer

Define ansible_user in the playbook using vars.