authorized_key - Adds or removes an SSH authorized key¶

Synopsis
Parameters
Examples
Return Values
Status
Maintenance
- Support
- Author

Synopsis ¶

Adds or removes SSH authorized keys for particular user accounts

Parameters ¶

Parameter	Choices/Defaults	Comments
comment (added in 2.4)		Change the comment on the public key. Rewriting the comment is useful in cases such as fetching it from GitHub or GitLab. If no comment is specified, the existing comment will be kept.
exclusive bool (added in 1.9)	Choices: no ← yes	Whether to remove all other non-specified keys from the authorized_keys file. Multiple keys can be specified in a single `key` string value by separating them by newlines. This option is not loop aware, so if you use `with_` , it will be exclusive per iteration of the loop, if you want multiple keys in the file you need to pass them all to `key` in a single batch as mentioned above.
follow bool (added in 2.7)	Choices: no ← yes	Follow path symlink instead of replacing it
key required		The SSH public key(s), as a string or (since 1.9) url (https://github.com/username.keys)
key_options (added in 1.4)		A string of ssh key options to be prepended to the key in the authorized_keys file
manage_dir bool	Choices: no yes ←	Whether this module should manage the directory of the authorized key file. If set, the module will create the directory, as well as set the owner and permissions of an existing directory. Be sure to set `manage_dir=no` if you are using an alternate directory for authorized_keys, as set with `path`, since you could lock yourself out of SSH access. See the example below.
path	Default: (homedir)+/.ssh/authorized_keys	Alternate path to the authorized_keys file
state	Choices: present ← absent	Whether the given key (with the given key_options) should or should not be in the file
user required		The username on the remote host whose authorized_keys file will be modified
validate_certs bool (added in 2.1)	Choices: no yes ←	This only applies if using a https url as the source of the keys. If set to `no`, the SSL certificates will not be validated. This should only set to `no` used on personally controlled sites using self-signed certificates as it avoids verifying the source site. Prior to 2.1 the code worked as if this was set to `yes`.

Examples ¶

- name: Set authorized key taken from file
  authorized_key:
    user: charlie
    state: present
    key: "{{ lookup('file', '/home/charlie/.ssh/id_rsa.pub') }}"

- name: Set authorized keys taken from url
  authorized_key:
    user: charlie
    state: present
    key: https://github.com/charlie.keys

- name: Set authorized key in alternate location
  authorized_key:
    user: charlie
    state: present
    key: "{{ lookup('file', '/home/charlie/.ssh/id_rsa.pub') }}"
    path: /etc/ssh/authorized_keys/charlie
    manage_dir: False

- name: Set up multiple authorized keys
  authorized_key:
    user: deploy
    state: present
    key: '{{ item }}'
  with_file:
    - public_keys/doe-jane
    - public_keys/doe-john

- name: Set authorized key defining key options
  authorized_key:
    user: charlie
    state: present
    key: "{{ lookup('file', '/home/charlie/.ssh/id_rsa.pub') }}"
    key_options: 'no-port-forwarding,from="10.0.1.1"'

- name: Set authorized key without validating the TLS/SSL certificates
  authorized_key:
    user: charlie
    state: present
    key: https://github.com/user.keys
    validate_certs: False

- name: Set authorized key, removing all the authorized keys already set
  authorized_key:
    user: root
    key: '{{ item }}'
    state: present
    exclusive: True
  with_file:
    - public_keys/doe-jane

- name: Set authorized key for user ubuntu copying it from current user
  authorized_key:
    user: ubuntu
    state: present
    key: "{{ lookup('file', lookup('env','HOME') + '/.ssh/id_rsa.pub') }}"

Return Values ¶

Common return values are documented here, the following are the fields unique to this module:

Key	Returned	Description
exclusive boolean	success	If the key has been forced to be exclusive or not.
key string	success	The key that the module was running against. Sample: https://github.com/user.keys
key_option string	success	Key options related to the key.
keyfile string	success	Path for authorized key file. Sample: /home/user/.ssh/authorized_keys
manage_dir boolean	success	Whether this module managed the directory of the authorized key file. Sample: True
path string	success	Alternate path to the authorized_keys file
state string	success	Whether the given key (with the given key_options) should or should not be in the file Sample: present
unique boolean	success	Whether the key is unique
user string	success	The username on the remote host whose authorized_keys file will be modified Sample: user
validate_certs boolean	success	This only applies if using a https url as the source of the keys. If set to `no`, the SSL certificates will not be validated. Sample: True

Status ¶

This module is flagged as preview which means that it is not guaranteed to have a backwards compatible interface.

Maintenance ¶

This module is flagged as core which means that it is maintained by the Ansible Core Team. See Module Maintenance & Support for more info.

For a list of other modules that are also maintained by the Ansible Core Team, see here.

Support ¶

For more information about Red Hat’s support of this module, please refer to this Knowledge Base article

Author ¶

Ansible Core Team

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