Ansible Role alternatives

This role manages symbolic links using the update-alternatives tool. Useful when multiple programs are installed but provide similar functionality (for example, different editors or Python interpreters).

Hints:

• The priority is simply an integer weight that the system uses when you’re in auto mode to choose which of several installed alternatives should be the current default.

• When you install multiple candidates for the same generic name (e.g. python3), and you’ve left the alternative in auto mode, the one with the highest priority number will be selected.

• When priorities are equal, the system will pick the first one that was registered (but you should avoid duplicate priorities to prevent ambiguity).

Tags

Tag	What it does
alternatives	Manages alternative programs for common commands.

Mandatory Role Variables

Variable	Description	Default Value
alternatives__alternatives	List of alternatives to remove or to deploy. Subkeys: link: String. The path to the symbolic link that should point to the real executable. This option is always required on RHEL-based distributions. On Debian-based distributions this option is required when the alternative name is unknown to the system. name: Mandatory, string. The generic name of the link. path: Optional, string. The path to the real executable that the link should point to. priority: Optional, number. The priority of the alternative. If no priority is given for creation 50 is used as a fallback. state: Optional, string. One of: selected: Default. Install the alternative (if not already installed), and set it as the currently selected alternative for the group. present: Install the alternative (if not already installed), but do not set it as the currently selected alternative for the group. auto: Install the alternative (if not already installed), and set the group to auto mode. absent: Remove the alternative.	[]

Example:

alternatives__alternatives:
  - link: '/usr/bin/python3'
    name: 'python3'
    path: '/usr/bin/python3.9'
    priority: '100'  # install python3.9 with higher priority
    state: 'auto'
  - link: '/usr/bin/python3'
    name: 'python3'
    path: '/usr/bin/python3.12'
    priority: '10'
    state: 'auto'
# => results in python3.9

License

The Unlicense

Author Information

Linuxfabrik GmbH, Zurich