Ansible loop within a loop - loops

Question

I'm really struggling to get my head around loops within Ansible when it comes to wanting more than one loop in a task.
Right now I'm writing a task to create some registry entries within Ansible and have the following which does work,
- name: Windows SSL/TLS Configuration
ansible.windows.win_regedit:
path: HKLM:\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\SecurityProviders\SCHANNEL\Protocols\SSL 3.0\{{ item.type }}
name: '{{ item.property }}'
data: '{{ item.value }}'
type: dword
state: present
loop:
- type: Server
property: Enabled
value: 0
- type: Server
property: DisabledByDefault
value: 1
- type: Client
property: Enabled
value: 0
- type: Client
property: DisabledByDefault
value: 1
However what I want to do is replace "SSL 3.0" with something like "{{ item.protocol }}" and be able to have it replaced with "SSL 2.0", "SSL 3.0" and "TLS 1.0", then creating the same entries within each of those.
I'd have liked to do them all within the same task, rather than having to run the exact same task 3 times with just one difference in the path.
Is what I want to do even possible?

Answer 1

Use loop_control to set loop_var. Otherwise the inner and outer loop use the same loop variable, which does not work.
See the documentation: Defining inner and outer variable names with loop_var
The documentation explains, that you have to put the inner loop into a different file in order to include it with include_tasks.
If you do not want that, you can add the protocols to each item in order to use with_subelements. Example:
- hosts: localhost
connection: local
vars:
protocols:
- "SSL 2.0"
- "SSL 3.0"
- "TLS 1.0"
keys:
- type: Server
property: Enabled
value: 0
protocols: "{{ protocols }}"
- type: Server
property: DisabledByDefault
value: 1
protocols: "{{ protocols }}"
- type: Client
property: Enabled
value: 0
protocols: "{{ protocols }}"
- type: Client
property: DisabledByDefault
value: 1
protocols: "{{ protocols }}"
tasks:
- debug: msg="{{item.0.type}} {{item.0.property}} {{item.0.value}} {{item.1}}"
with_subelements:
- "{{ keys }}"
- protocols
This will generate 12 keys:
$ ansible-playbook example.yaml
[WARNING]: provided hosts list is empty, only localhost is available. Note that the implicit localhost does
not match 'all'
PLAY [localhost] **********************************************************************************************
TASK [Gathering Facts] ****************************************************************************************
ok: [localhost]
TASK [debug] **************************************************************************************************
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Server', 'property': 'Enabled', 'value': 0}, 'SSL 2.0']) => {
"msg": "Server Enabled 0 SSL 2.0"
}
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Server', 'property': 'Enabled', 'value': 0}, 'SSL 3.0']) => {
"msg": "Server Enabled 0 SSL 3.0"
}
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Server', 'property': 'Enabled', 'value': 0}, 'TLS 1.0']) => {
"msg": "Server Enabled 0 TLS 1.0"
}
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Server', 'property': 'DisabledByDefault', 'value': 1}, 'SSL 2.0']) => {
"msg": "Server DisabledByDefault 1 SSL 2.0"
}
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Server', 'property': 'DisabledByDefault', 'value': 1}, 'SSL 3.0']) => {
"msg": "Server DisabledByDefault 1 SSL 3.0"
}
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Server', 'property': 'DisabledByDefault', 'value': 1}, 'TLS 1.0']) => {
"msg": "Server DisabledByDefault 1 TLS 1.0"
}
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Client', 'property': 'Enabled', 'value': 0}, 'SSL 2.0']) => {
"msg": "Client Enabled 0 SSL 2.0"
}
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Client', 'property': 'Enabled', 'value': 0}, 'SSL 3.0']) => {
"msg": "Client Enabled 0 SSL 3.0"
}
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Client', 'property': 'Enabled', 'value': 0}, 'TLS 1.0']) => {
"msg": "Client Enabled 0 TLS 1.0"
}
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Client', 'property': 'DisabledByDefault', 'value': 1}, 'SSL 2.0']) => {
"msg": "Client DisabledByDefault 1 SSL 2.0"
}
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Client', 'property': 'DisabledByDefault', 'value': 1}, 'SSL 3.0']) => {
"msg": "Client DisabledByDefault 1 SSL 3.0"
}
ok: [localhost] => (item=[{'type': 'Client', 'property': 'DisabledByDefault', 'value': 1}, 'TLS 1.0']) => {
"msg": "Client DisabledByDefault 1 TLS 1.0"
}
PLAY RECAP ****************************************************************************************************
localhost : ok=2 changed=0 unreachable=0 failed=0