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DevOps / Ansible Interview questions

What is Ansible Vault?

Ansible Vault is a built-in feature for encrypting sensitive content, like passwords, API keys, or entire variable files, so secrets can be safely committed to version control alongside the rest of a playbook.

ansible-vault encrypt secrets.yml
ansible-vault view secrets.yml
ansible-playbook site.yml --ask-vault-pass

Vault can encrypt a whole file or just a single string value with ansible-vault encrypt_string, letting a sensitive value sit inline in an otherwise plaintext file. At runtime, ansible-playbook needs the vault password, supplied interactively, from a password file, or via a vault ID for setups using multiple different passwords, to decrypt the content in memory before use. This keeps secrets out of plaintext in the repository while still letting playbooks reference them like any other variable.

What does ansible-vault encrypt_string let you do?
What must ansible-playbook have to decrypt vault content at runtime?

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What is Ansible? What are the key features of Ansible? What is a playbook in Ansible? Define an inventory file in Ansible? What is a module in Ansible? What are Ansible facts? Describe roles in Ansible? What are the types of variables in Ansible? List the components of an Ansible role directory? How do you use handlers in Ansible? What is Ansible Vault? Explain the purpose of tags in Ansible playbooks? What is ansible.cfg? How do you apply become for privilege escalation in Ansible? What is Ansible Galaxy? Why doesn't Ansible require agents on managed nodes? How does Ansible ensure idempotency in playbook runs? What is the difference between include and import in Ansible? When should you use loops instead of duplicating tasks? What happens when a task fails in an Ansible playbook? How is variable precedence resolved in Ansible? Why should you avoid hardcoding secrets in playbooks? What is the difference between Ansible and Chef/Puppet? How does Ansible handle privilege escalation with become? When would you choose dynamic inventory over static inventory? How can you optimize playbook execution speed? What is the difference between copy and template modules? Why do we use handlers instead of regular tasks for restarts? How does Ansible's Jinja2 templating work in playbooks? What is the difference between roles and collections? When should you use blocks with rescue in Ansible? How is check mode implemented in Ansible? Why doesn't Ansible require a central server by default? What is the difference between ansible-playbook and ansible ad-hoc commands? How do you troubleshoot a failing Ansible task? Explain the internal working of Ansible's execution model? Explain the execution flow of an Ansible playbook run? Explain the lifecycle of a task in an Ansible play? How does Ansible guarantee idempotent module behavior internally? What happens internally when Ansible gathers facts? How can you optimize a large-scale Ansible deployment for performance? Which is better and why: linear or free strategy for a large inventory? How does forking improve execution speed in Ansible? Why is idempotency critical to Ansible's module design? How do you troubleshoot slow fact gathering in Ansible? Explain the internal working of Ansible's variable precedence resolution? What happens when a handler is notified multiple times in a play? How does Ansible implement fact caching internally? Explain the execution flow of a rolling update using serial? How can you optimize role design to avoid duplicate work at scale?
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