pinging ec2 instance from ansible - ssh

Question

I have an ec2 amazon linux running which I can ssh in to using:
ssh -i "keypair.pem" ec2-user#some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com
but when I try to ping the server using ansible I get:
testserver | UNREACHABLE! => {
"changed": false,
"msg": "Failed to connect to the host via ssh.",
"unreachable": true
}
I'm using the following hosts file:
testserver ansible_ssh_host=some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com ansible_ssh_user=ec2-user ansible_ssh_private_key_file=/Users/me/playbook/key-pair.pem
and running the following command to run ansible:
ansible testserver -i hosts -m ping -vvvvv
The output is:
<some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com> ESTABLISH SSH CONNECTION FOR USER: ec2-user
<some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com> SSH: ansible.cfg set ssh_args: (-o)(ControlMaster=auto)(-o)(ControlPersist=60s)
<some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com> SSH: ANSIBLE_PRIVATE_KEY_FILE/private_key_file/ansible_ssh_private_key_file set: (-o)(IdentityFile="/Users/me/playbook/key-pair.pem")
<some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com> SSH: ansible_password/ansible_ssh_pass not set: (-o)(KbdInteractiveAuthentication=no)(-o)(PreferredAuthentications=gssapi-with-mic,gssapi-keyex,hostbased,publickey)(-o)(PasswordAuthentication=no)
<some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com> SSH: ANSIBLE_REMOTE_USER/remote_user/ansible_user/user/-u set: (-o)(User=ec2-user)
<some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com> SSH: ANSIBLE_TIMEOUT/timeout set: (-o)(ConnectTimeout=10)
<some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com> SSH: PlayContext set ssh_common_args: ()
<some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com> SSH: PlayContext set ssh_extra_args: ()
<some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com> SSH: found only ControlPersist; added ControlPath: (-o)(ControlPath=/Users/me/.ansible/cp/ansible-ssh-%h-%p-%r)
<some-ip.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com> SSH: EXEC ssh -C -vvv -o ControlMaster=auto -o ControlPersist=60s -o 'IdentityFile="/Users/me/playbook/key-pair.pem"' -o KbdInteractiveAuthentication=no -o PreferredAuthentications=gssapi-with-mic,gssapi-keyex,hostbased,publickey -o PasswordAuthentication=no -o User=ec2-user -o ConnectTimeout=10 -o ControlPath=/Users/me/.ansible/cp/ansible-ssh-%h-%p-%r ec2-52-18-106-35.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com '/bin/sh -c '"'"'( umask 22 && mkdir -p "` echo $HOME/.ansible/tmp/ansible-tmp-1462096401.65-214839021792201 `" && echo "` echo $HOME/.ansible/tmp/ansible-tmp-1462096401.65-214839021792201 `" )'"'"''
testserver | UNREACHABLE! => {
"changed": false,
"msg": "Failed to connect to the host via ssh.",
"unreachable": true
}
What am i doing wrong?

Answer 1

Try this Solution it worked fine for me
ansible ipaddress -m ping -i inventory -u ec2-user
where inventory is the host file name.
inventory :
[host]
xx.xx.xx.xx
[host:vars]
ansible_user=ec2-user
ansible_ssh_private_key_file=/location of your pem file/filename.pem
I was facing the problem as I didn't give the location of the host file I was referring to.

Answer 2

This is what my host file looks like.
[apache] is the group of hosts on which we are going to install apache server.
ansible_ssh_private_key_file should be the path of the dowloaded .pem file to access your instances. In my case both instances have same credentials.
[apache]
50.112.133.205 ansible_ssh_user=ubuntu
54.202.7.87 ansible_ssh_user=ubuntu
[apache:vars]
ansible_user=ubuntu
ansible_ssh_private_key_file=/home/hashimyousaf/Desktop/hashim_key_oregon.pem

Answer 3

I was having a similar problem, and reading throughTroubleshooting Connecting to Your Instance helped me. Specifically, I was pinging an Ubuntu instance from an Amazon-Linux instance but forgot to change the connection username from "ec2-user" to "ubuntu"!

Answer 4

You have to change the hosts file and make sure you have the correct username
test2 ansible_ssh_host=something.something.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com ansible_ssh_user=theUser
'test2' - is the name I have give to the ssh machice on my local ansible hosts file
'ansible_ssh_host=something.something.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com' - This is the connection to the ec2 instance
'ansible_ssh_user=theUser' - The user of the instance. (Important)
'ssh' into your instance
[theUser#Instance:] make sure you copy the 'theUser' into the hosts and place as the 'ansible_ssh_user' variable
then try to ping it.
If this does not work, check if you have rights to the ICMP packeting in the amazon aws enabled.

Answer 5

Worked for me ->
vi inventory
[hosts]
serveripaddress ansible_ssh_user=ec2-user
[hosts:vars]
ansible_user=ec2-user
ansible_ssh_private_key_file=/home/someuser/ansible1.pem
chmod 400 ansible1.pem
ansible -i inventory hosts -m ping -u ec2-user