Windows Working Group agenda - Jul-Dec 2017

[dagwieers]

This agenda has been migrated to a new location: #294

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The Windows Working Group is focused on improving Ansible's management of Windows hosts. The group meets every week on Tuesdays at 20:00 UTC (see ical)

More information related to the Windows Working Group is available at:
https://github.com/ansible/community/wiki/Windows

Feel free to add your questions to this ticket to be discussed during the upcoming meeting.

After being discussed, raised items are being updated, and after a month resolved items are being hidden from view (but remain accessible).

(Migrated from the previous agenda at #153)

[dagwieers]

New windows modules waiting for review/feedback:

• win_whoami: win_whoami: new module to emulate whoami executable ansible#33295 new in v2.5
• win_disk_facts: Added new module win_disk_facts ansible#32935
• win_audit_policy_system: new windows module win_audit_policy_system ansible#31046 new in v2.5
• win_audit_rule: new windows module, win_audit_rule ansible#30473 new in v2.5
• win_rabbitmq_plugin: rabbitmq_plugin for Windows ansible#28017 new in v2.4
• win_power_plan: added windows module win_power_plan with integration test ansible#27966 new in v2.4
• win_eventlog_entry: New Module: Write Windows event log entries (win_eventlog_entry) ansible#27828 new in v2.4
• win_eventlog: New Module: Manage Windows event logs (win_eventlog) ansible#27827 new in v2.4
• win_disk_management: Adding new Windows module win_disk_management ansible#27634
• win_firewall_rule: [18807] win_firewall_rule module uses HNetCfg.FwPolicy2 COM Object ansible#27381 (reimplemented)
• win_hotfix: win_hotfix: new module to install Windows hotfixes ansible#27260 new in v2.4
• win_mapped_drive: win_mapped_drive: new module ansible#27020 new in v2.4
• win_domain_group: win_domain_group: new module ansible#26682 new in v2.4
• win_toast: Windows: A module for creating Toast notifications on Modern Windows versions. ansible#26675 new in v2.4
• win_wait_for: win_wait_for: added module ansible#26556 new in v2.4
• win_xml: win_xml module for manipulating XML files on Windows ansible#26404
• win_security_policy: win_secedit: Added module with tests/diff mode ansible#26332 new in v2.4
• win_group_membership: New Module: Manage Windows local group membership (win_group_member) ansible#26307 new in v2.4
• win_user_right: win_user_right: add module with tests ansible#26276 new in v2.4
• win_wakeonlan: win_wakeonlan: New module to send Wake-On-Lan packets ansible#26232 new in v2.4
• win_certificate: New module 'win_certificate' ansible#25837
• win_pagefile: Adds win_pagefile module ansible#25605 new in v2.4
• win_dsc: New module: win dsc ansible#24872 new in v2.4
• win_domain_user: New module: Add module or managing Windows Active Directory users (windows/win_domain_user) ansible#24075 new in v2.4
• win_psmodule: New module: Add module to install/remove/register/unregiser windows powershell modules (windows/win_psmodule) ansible#23604 new in v2.4
• win_route: New module: Add module to add/remove a network static route on windows (windows/win_route) ansible#23405 new in v2.4
• win_firewall: New module: Add module to manage Windows Firewall (windows/win_firewall) ansible#23224 new in v2.4
• win_defrag: New module: Add module to defragment Windows local volumes (windows/win_defrag) ansible#23140 new in v2.4

Please review these tickets on a weekly basis (if there was new progress, otherwise add instructions to the owner how to continue).

Once merged, please add to CHANGELOG.md !

[dagwieers]

Effort to have integration tests for all Windows modules. Please review and merge:

• win_iis_webapppool -- @jborean93 -- win_iis_webapppool: tests, check_mode, bugfixes ansible#25869
• win_iis_website -- @jborean93 -- win_iis_website: Add integration tests, check mode and better param support ansible#25902

[dagwieers]

(@jborean93) Review and merge: ansible/ansible#23119

Migrated from #153 (comment)

[dagwieers]

(@dagwieers) Investigate and recover from "Connection refused" errors in WinRM. ansible/ansible#25532

Migrated from #153 (comment)

[nitzmahone]

Discuss perf changes being made to Windows CI (windows/ci/smoketest, elimination of group1/2/3)

[dagwieers]

Can we get ansible/ansible#26533 merged ?

Update (nitzmahone): merged

[dagwieers]

Can we get ansible/ansible#26612 merged ?

[dagwieers]

Can we get ansible/ansible#26512 merged ?

Update (jhawkesworth): merged 20 July

[dagwieers]

Maybe it is time to think about what we still want to achieve before the v2.4 release. For example, it would be nice to finish integration tests for all modules that will ship in v2.4. Or have Windows coverage support. Or finish organizing the Windows/DSC documentation, etc.

What is achievable in the remaining time ?
And what can we communicate to the community if we need help ?

Update (jhawkesworth): Discussed. Summary: As much as we can.
Note that documentation can be tackled after core code freeze as code freeze does not apply to docs. Will be a module review before modules freeze. Coverage testing for likely to arrive after 2.4.

[jhawkesworth]

I'd like to discuss any ideas anyone has for making debugging powershell modules simpler and quicker to setup, following recent discussion on the #ansible-windows freenode channel.
Best way to tackle seems to be to set up sharing code between controller and windows host, load shared module code, run in ISE, load module code, run and debug in ISE. I will experiment and see if I can document something.
Update 2 (jhawkesworth): jborean93 made this documentation PR which has now been merged: ansible/ansible#27308

[dagwieers]

In a few months Windows Subsystem for Linux will become fully supported. At that time we need to re-clarify our position on running Ansible on WSL. Will we actively test it in Shippable as a supported configuration ? Will it be best-effort or community-supported ? Do we consider WSL as just another Linux, or does it need special care ?

https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2017/07/28/windows-subsystem-for-linux-out-of-beta/

Update (jborean93): this doesn't change our support decision, WSL is still a developer tool and not designed to run in production.

@jborean93 The point being that in a few months it is no longer a developer tool, it's available through normal channels on Windows 10. In any case (at that time) we will have to update the documentation: NOTE: The Windows Subsystem for Linux (Beta) is not supported by Microsoft or Ansible and should not be used for production systems.

[nitzmahone]

Realized I thought of this a couple weeks ago and didn't include it on the review, but do we want to rename win_group_member to win_group_membership to be consistent with some other things (eg win_domain_membership), since the resource we're editing is a membership, not a member...

Update (jborean93): agreed
Addressed in PR #27614

[andrewsaraceni]

@nitzmahone @jborean93 I can put in a PR for the rename if that's helpful (unless you're already taking care of it).

[nitzmahone]

@andrewsaraceni sure, go for it! If you do, please also rename in CHANGELOG... Thanks!

[andrewsaraceni]

Thanks @nitzmahone, just submitted PR ansible/ansible#27614 for this - let me know if you see anything I missed.

Update: nitzmahone (merged)

[jborean93]

Would like a consensus for the variable we set when checking if --diff has been set. Currently I use $diff_mode but others are using $diff_support. This will make it easier to check if a parameter support diff if we use one variable.

See ansible/ansible#26468 (comment) for more details.

Edit: $diff_mode is the chosen option

[gundalow]

Ansible Contributor Summit 5 (Part of AnsibleFest 2017 San Francisco)

When: 2017-09-06:
Notes: https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/ansible-summit-september-2017
Event will be in person + online (Video + IRC)

Agenda is open for topics for the next Contributors Summit

Please add (and vote +1) for any topics.

[gundalow]

NOTE: meetings are canceled for the week Aug 21st to 25th due to 'all hands' meeting for the core team. We will resume normal schedule after that.

[dagwieers]

I have some "old" new stuff to discuss:

• win_robocopy: Check-mode support, improved return code and docs -- win_robocopy: Check-mode support, improved return code and docs ansible#25410
• win_get_url: Add use_proxy, headers and timeout -- win_get_url: Add use_proxy, headers and timeout ansible#26612
• win_shortcut: Fix for env variables/UNC paths -- win_shortcut: Support environment variables/UNC paths ansible#27089
• win_reboot: post_reboot_delay parameter and async/check-mode fixes win_reboot: Bugfix to check-mode and async support, and features ansible#28448
• wait_for_connection: Remove transport_test for WinRM --
  Remove transport_test for some connection types ansible#28450
• pywinrm: Fix to retry on "Connection refused" (example) -- Overcome "Connection Refused" on some operations diyan/pywinrm#174

[jhawkesworth]

Could we spend some time seeing if there are any more modules that can make it in before the freeze? Update (jhawkesworth) done

Also re SID lookup utils, now that the .psm1 has been merged is anyone looking at getting the modules to use it? See ansible/ansible#19219 (comment) Update (jhawkesworth) see update on comment below.

PR has been merged and issue closed

[jborean93]

@jhawkesworth I was going to have a look at using them in win_owner/acl/... but it will probably be a 2.5 thing.

Update (jhawkesworth) @andrewsaraceni has kindly volunteered to create a PR (at which point we can probably close ansible/ansible#19219)

PR has been merged and issue closed

[jhawkesworth]

I'd like to discuss whether its worth considering making a distinction between paths and command lines, following the discussion ansible/ansible#32469
as @jborean93 observes originally the path type just enabled expansion of envrionment variables but then was later modified to validate paths. However in the case above the module parameter isn't simply a path to a file, but a command line (i.e. a path to an .exe plus optional command line args), so maybe over time the module parameter name aliased and then changed to 'command_line' (or something better).

Also perhaps having a 'expand' module parameter type might be a nice thing, which just expands any env vars. Suggestions for a better name welcome.

[dagwieers]

@ar7z1 and I want to discuss how to manage firewall rules with overlapping profiles (ansible/ansible#32478 (comment)) in the next meeting.

EDIT: discussed on Nov. 14 meeting, @ar7z1 to try adding basic filtering by profile; possibly a new allow_multiple arg for editing multiple matching rules. Also discussed rule merging, but that should probably be pursued separately later, as it's potentially a minefield...

[jhawkesworth]

Just want to check everyone ok before I delete the following wiki pages which I think are now superceeded by the detailed windows guide documentation.

https://github.com/ansible/community/wiki/Windows%3A-documentation
https://github.com/ansible/community/wiki/Windows--ideas-for-documentation-new-structure
https://github.com/ansible/community/wiki/Windows-Paths---prescriptive-style

@jhawkesworth to delete pages after a quick scan for any content that didn't get migrated
EDIT @jhawkesworth removed content, pointed at detailed guides.

[jborean93]

Quickly talk about the win_stat PR ansible/ansible#33005 and the behaviour of some of the return values. Are the names of hlnk_targets and lnk_type fine, they are not used in stat so I had to set my own names here. Also currently stat does not set islnk: True when the file has other hard link references. I went the route of setting islnk: True in these cases as hlnk_targets and lnk_type are set accordingly in these cases but was hoping for a consensus before moving ahead.

EDIT: discussed Nov 21; islnk will only be true for symlinks, adding isjunction for junctions; hlnk_targets will always exist and be empty unless multiple links to the same content exist

[dagwieers]

I discovered an issue with the use of win_get_url where the default timeout parameter (at 10 seconds) behaves differently on Unix as on Windows. On Windows it appears to mean the complete download needs to finish within that timeframe, whereas on Unix this is related to the connection timeout, not the operation timeout.

A default operation timeout of 10 seconds is problematic, and breaks existing playbooks (on larger files).

EDIT: discussed Nov 21; appears to be related to delays before file download (possibly lab env quirk), @nitzmahone unable to replicate with short timeout and large file on devel

[marqelme]

Please decide if following Pull Requests are ready to get merged or if something is missing / needs to be changed:
win_disk_management
ansible/ansible#27634
win_disk_facts
ansible/ansible#32935
(EDIT: win_disk_facts merged, more discussion on win_disk_management)

[pablodav]

How do you setup windows environment for development?

Could be useful for new developers to have some reference in:
https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/devel/dev_guide/developing_modules_general_windows.html#windows-integration-testing

Something like vagrant and molecule? ansible/molecule#607 (comment)

[dagwieers]

@pablodav This is not a support forum, but the agenda of a meeting. You can discuss on mailinglist or IRC, open an issue related to new functionality (or documentation), or create a PR with suggested changes. Also look at: ansible/ansible#33515

[quorten]

PR #26934 looks like it is ready for merging. The Windows Working Group should see if this should get merged or closed. From my testing, the change is required for proper IPv6 winrm support. It would be great if winrm IPv6 support could be functional for the Ansible 2.5 release.
(solved via ansible/ansible#34072)

[jborean93]

I would like to talk about the win_disk_management PR, after reviewing it I think it should be split into 3 different modules as it touches 3 different components

* volumes/disks
* partitions of a disk
* format of a partition

I've put my thoughts in this comment ansible/ansible#27634 (review) and am interested in what the others think.

(EDIT: consensus is that it should be smaller modules, PR will be closed with that recommendation)

[jhawkesworth]

~~I suggest we postpone further meetings until 2018. ~~

[jborean93]

That's probably a sensible idea, both @nitzmahone and I will be away next week so should probably postpone until the 9th.

[gundalow]

The 2.5 freeze dates (merge deadlines) have been pushed out by a week.

Please see updated dates
https://github.com/ansible/ansible/blob/devel/docs/docsite/rst/roadmap/ROADMAP_2_5.rst

To see whats change please see ansible/ansible@1826c27

[dagwieers]

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This agenda has been migrated to a new location: #294

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