rkrzr · August 12, 2025 21:23 · Dec 6, 2017 · Nov 17, 2017
diff --git a/auto_tags.py b/auto_tags.py
@@ -32,23 +32,17 @@ class CallbackModule(CallbackBase):
     def v2_playbook_on_start(self, playbook):
         """
         Dynamically add a tag of the same name to each role.
+        Note: Plays, roles, task_blocks and tasks can have tags.
         """
-        # Plays, tasks and task_blocks can have tags: play.tags, task.tags, task_block.tags
         plays = playbook.get_plays()
 
         # Note: Although identical roles are shared between plays we cannot deduplicate them,
         # since Ansible treats them as different objects internally
         roles = [role for play in plays for role in play.get_roles()]
 
-        # Each role can have zero or more task blocks
-        # For each task block we assign a tag that has the same name as the role it belongs to
+        # Note: Tags for roles are set dynamically in `_load_role_data` instead of in __init__
+        # I don't know why they do that.
         for role in roles:
             role_name = role._role_name
-            task_blocks = role.get_task_blocks()
-
-            for task_block in task_blocks:
-                if role_name not in task_block.tags:
-                    print('Assigning dynamic tag: {}'.format(role_name))
-                    task_block.tags += [role_name]
-                else:
-                    print('Warning: Not assigning duplicate tag: {}'.format(role_name))
+            if role_name not in role.tags:
+                role.tags += [role_name]
diff --git a/auto_tags.py b/auto_tags.py
@@ -0,0 +1,54 @@
+"""
+This module implements an Ansible plugin that is triggered at the start of a playbook.
+
+The plugin dynamically generates a tag for each role. Each tag has the same name as its role.
+The advantage of this is that it saves you some boilerplate, because you don't have to wrap
+all tasks of a role in an additional block and assign a tag to that.
+Additionally, it works automatically when you add new roles to your playbook.
+
+Usage is exactly the same as without this plugin:
+
+ansible-playbook --tags=some_tag provision.yml
+
+Here, the "some_tag" tag was generated dynamically (assuming there is a "some_tag" role).
+
+Installation:
+1. Place this file in `plugins/callbacks/auto_tags.py` (relative to your playbook root)
+2. Add the following two lines to your `ansible.cfg` file:
+
+callback_plugins = plugins/callbacks
+callback_whitelist = auto_tags
+"""
+from __future__ import print_function
+from ansible.plugins.callback import CallbackBase
+
+
+class CallbackModule(CallbackBase):
+    """
+    Ansible supports several types of plugins. We are using the *callback* type here, since
+    it seemed the best choice for our use case, because it allows you to hook into the start
+    of a playbook.
+    """
+    def v2_playbook_on_start(self, playbook):
+        """
+        Dynamically add a tag of the same name to each role.
+        """
+        # Plays, tasks and task_blocks can have tags: play.tags, task.tags, task_block.tags
+        plays = playbook.get_plays()
+
+        # Note: Although identical roles are shared between plays we cannot deduplicate them,
+        # since Ansible treats them as different objects internally
+        roles = [role for play in plays for role in play.get_roles()]
+
+        # Each role can have zero or more task blocks
+        # For each task block we assign a tag that has the same name as the role it belongs to
+        for role in roles:
+            role_name = role._role_name
+            task_blocks = role.get_task_blocks()
+
+            for task_block in task_blocks:
+                if role_name not in task_block.tags:
+                    print('Assigning dynamic tag: {}'.format(role_name))
+                    task_block.tags += [role_name]
+                else:
+                    print('Warning: Not assigning duplicate tag: {}'.format(role_name))
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