How to execute a set of commands though the vmware_vm_shelll module in ansible?

Question

I wanted to unjoin a windows machine from a specific domain and join the machine to a WORKGROUP with the help of the domain credentials. I used Powershell credential objects to prevent the hassle of authentication prompts in the automation . The first command executed successfully ($Pass = {{ ansible_password }} | ConvertTo-SecureString -AsPlainText -Force ) . The 3 PS commands are as follows;

$Pass = {{ ansible_password }} | ConvertTo-SecureString -AsPlainText -Force 
$credential = New-Object System.Management.Automation.PSCredential('{ ansible_user }', $Pass)
Remove-Computer -UnJoinDomainCredential $credential -WorkgroupName 'LOCAL' -PassThru -Verbose -Force -Restart

.

- name: join  {{ vm_cloned_name }} to workgroup with manual reboot in later task
       community.vmware.vmware_vm_shell:
         datacenter: "{{ datacenter_name }}"
         folder: "/{{ datacenter_name }}/vm/"
         vm_id: "{{ vm_cloned_name }}"
         vm_username: "{{ localusername }}"
         vm_password: "{{ password }}"
         vm_shell: 'C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowershell\v1.0\powershell.exe'
         vm_shell_args: "{{ $Pass = '{{ ansible_password }}' | ConvertTo-SecureString -AsPlainText -Force ; $credential = New-Object System.Management.Automation.PSCredential('{{ ansible_user }}', $Pass) ;  Remove-Computer -UnJoinDomainCredential $credential -WorkgroupName 'LOCAL' -PassThru -Verbose -Force -Restart }}"
         vm_shell_cwd: 'C:\Users\administrator\Desktop'
         wait_for_process: true
         timeout: 100
       register: workgroup_res
       tags: join-workgroup

the ansible error logs are as follows:

cmd_line": "\"C:\\Windows\\System32\\WindowsPowershell\\v1.0\\powershell.exe\" $credential = New-Object System.Management.Automation.PSCredential('[email protected]', $Pass)",
  "changed": false,
  "msg": "Failed to execute command",

Answer 1

You're using Jinja2 templating incorrectly:

• you have everything within the first set of curly braces, including PoweShell commands
• within that, you have ansible variables within another set of curly braces
• on top of that, these internal curly braces are quoted. It should not work like that.

A correct templating would look like this (note I use multiline YAML strings to improve readability):

     - name: Join {{ vm_cloned_name }} to workgroup with manual reboot in later task
       community.vmware.vmware_vm_shell:
         datacenter: "{{ datacenter_name }}"
         folder: "/{{ datacenter_name }}/vm/"
         vm_id: "{{ vm_cloned_name }}"
         vm_username: "{{ localusername }}"
         vm_password: "{{ password }}"
         vm_shell: 'C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowershell\v1.0\powershell.exe'
         vm_shell_args: |
           $Pass = '{{ ansible_password }}' | ConvertTo-SecureString -AsPlainText -Force ;
           $credential = New-Object System.Management.Automation.PSCredential('{{ ansible_user }}', $Pass) ;
           Remove-Computer -UnJoinDomainCredential $credential -WorkgroupName 'LOCAL' -PassThru -Verbose -Force -Restart
         vm_shell_cwd: 'C:\Users\administrator\Desktop'
         wait_for_process: true
         timeout: 100
       register: workgroup_res
       tags: join-workgroup

Without multiline YAML it would be the same - you would need to remove the curly braces surrounding the whole command.