Write variable to a file in Ansible

Question

An important comment from tmoschou:

As of Ansible 2.10, The documentation for ansible.builtin.copy says:
If you need variable interpolation in copied files, use the
ansible.builtin.template module. Using a variable in the content
field will result in unpredictable output.

For more details see this and an explanation

---

Original answer:

You could use the copy module, with the content parameter:

- copy: content="{{ your_json_feed }}" dest=/path/to/destination/file

The docs here: copy module

Based on Ramon's answer I run into an error. The problem where spaces in the JSON I tried to write I got it fixed by changing the task in the playbook to look like:

- copy:
    content: "{{ your_json_feed }}"
    dest: "/path/to/destination/file"

As of now I am not sure why this was needed. My best guess is that it had something to do with how variables are replaced in Ansible and the resulting file is parsed.

Unless you are writing very small files, you should probably use templates.

Example:

- name: copy upstart script
  template: 
    src: myCompany-service.conf.j2 
    dest: "/etc/init/myCompany-service.conf"

We can directly specify the destination file with the dest option now. In the below example, the output json is stored into the /tmp/repo_version_file

- name: Get repository file repo_version model to set ambari_managed_repositories=false
  uri:
    url: 'http://<server IP>:8080/api/v1/stacks/HDP/versions/3.1/repository_versions/1?fields=operating_systems/*'
    method: GET
    force_basic_auth: yes
    user: xxxxx
    password: xxxxx
    headers:
      "X-Requested-By": "ambari"
      "Content-type": "Application/json"
    status_code: 200
    dest: /tmp/repo_version_file