Overview¶
Welcome to the F5 BIG-IP Ansible documentation.
Use the provided Ansible collections and modules to create, edit, update, and delete configuration objects on BIG-IP, BIG-IQ, and F5OS based platforms.
Releases and versioning¶
Learn more about our Support Policy and BIG-IP product support policies.
Important
- F5 follows Ansible’s model and supports the two most recent major stable releases.
- F5 Ansible Collections are supported for the most recent minor version
- F5 does not back-port changes to earlier versions of Ansible Core or Collections.
F5 Imperative and Declarative collections for Ansible¶
These collections provide modules for both F5 BIG-IP and F5 BIG-IQ platforms:
BIG-IP¶
These BIG-IP versions are supported in these Ansible Community releases.
| BIG-IP/Ansible Community | Version v6.x | Version v7.x | Version v8.x |
|---|---|---|---|
| BIG-IP 17.x | X | X | X |
| BIG-IP 16.x | X | X | X |
| BIG-IP 15.x | X | X | X |
| BIG-IP 14.x | X | X | X |
| BIG-IP 13.x | X | X | X |
BIG-IQ¶
These BIG-IQ versions are supported in these Ansible Community releases.
| BIG-IQ/Ansible Community | Version v6.x | Version v7.x | Version v8.x |
|---|---|---|---|
| BIG-IQ 8.x | X | X | X |
| BIG-IQ 7.x | X | X | X |
| BIG-IQ 6.x | X | X | X |
Experimental Module Support¶
F5 Networks accepts support cases for F5 modules that have shipped with supported versions of Ansible. See the preceding table for details.
F5 Modules are installed via the tagged Collection releases on Automation Hub and Ansible Galaxy. Updates only within the github repositories are considered to be experimental and not production-ready.
If an experimental module’s DOCUMENTATION block has a completed Tested platforms section,
then the module is likely complete and ready for testing.
Get help¶
F5 provides support for the F5 Modules for Ansible. For more information, see this page.
The community also provides informal support through a number of channels.
If you’d like community support, you can open an issue with the github links below:
- F5 Imperative Collection for Ansible:
- F5 Declarative Collection for Ansible:
When communicating with F5 on the Issues page, use the GitHub user interface, rather than email.
For best practices, see tips for filing issues.
Send email
Contact us at solutionsfeedback@f5.com for general feedback or enhancement requests.
Exposing confidential information
When submitting a request for help or feedback, you should NEVER:
- Enter any private or personally identifying information about you, your network, organization, etc.
- Enter any passwords/credentials, logs, IP addresses, or servers/server ports.
- Expect that an F5 employee will immediately respond. Employees offer best-effort assistance, but there may be times when responses are delayed.
If you need more in-depth technical assistance, you can contact F5 Support.
Tips for filing issues
If you run into any issues while working with the F5 Imperative Collection for Ansible, before you file an bug-report go through this these steps first, this is to ensure that F5 triages the problems as efficiently as possible:
- Check if the issue has been discussed and is closed/resolved
Be verbose
When you file an issue with the F5 Ansible modules, an Issue template appears.
F5 will try to reproduce your environment, so in the template, please provide as much information as possible.
Some things F5 wants to know are:
- Which F5 product
- Which version of that product
- Which Ansible version
- Which Python version
- Are you using a module in Ansible upstream or one directly from this repo (there are hashes for this)
- Which Ansible plays reproduce the problem
- If this is a feature request, which tmsh commands meet your needs
- If this is a feature request for a module, provide an example (in your own YAML) and what you think the parameters to the would look like
- If you have uploaded a qkview to F5
- Reproduced the problem with the latest updated F5Ansible Galaxy Role
The Issue template asks these questions.
If the issue seems to be a bug, add the label bug-report to it.
Some of the things that F5 does not want, and will never ask for are:
- passwords
- license keys
- public disclosure of your company or company contact info
Do not comment on closed issues
When you comment on closed issues:
- F5 cannot reproduce the issue properly in the code base.
- F5 does not usually receive the notification for the comment.
Why is commenting on old issues a problem for the code base?
When you open an issue, F5 creates new files with your issue name in the integration test directory.
For example, if you open an issue and give it the number 1234, then F5 creates issue-01234.yaml in the source tree. This file is specific to your issue and no other issues.
When the F5 developers solve the problem, they ensure that future F5 Ansible modules continue to work.
If you do not create a new issue:
- F5 might accidentally change code that was already working.
- It is harder to track which issue any new code relates to.
- It is harder to repro other issues over time.
Because of this, F5 asks that you not comment on closed issues.
F5 Inc. contributor license agreement¶
Before you can contribute to any project sponsored by F5 Inc. on GitHub, you must sign a Contributor License Agreement (CLA).
If you sign as an individual, you should talk to your employer (if applicable) before signing the CLA, because some employment agreements may have restrictions on your contributions to other projects.
Otherwise, by submitting a CLA, you represent that you are legally entitled to grant the licenses recited therein.
If your employer has rights to intellectual property that you create, such as your contributions, you represent that you have received permission to make contributions on behalf of that employer, that your employer has waived such rights for your contributions, or that your employer has executed a separate CLA with F5.
If you are signing on behalf of a company, you represent that you are legally entitled to grant the license recited therein. You represent further that each employee of the entity that submits contributions has authorization to submit such contributions on behalf of the entity pursuant to the CLA.
Click the link below to download the PDF:
F5 Contributor License Agreement (CLA)
What’s next?