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community.general.pids module – Retrieves process IDs list if the process is running otherwise return empty list

Note

This module is part of the community.general collection (version 10.7.3).

You might already have this collection installed if you are using the ansible package. It is not included in ansible-core. To check whether it is installed, run ansible-galaxy collection list.

To install it, use: ansible-galaxy collection install community.general. You need further requirements to be able to use this module, see Requirements for details.

To use it in a playbook, specify: community.general.pids.

Synopsis

  • Retrieves a list of PIDs of given process name in Ansible controller/controlled machines. Returns an empty list if no process in that name exists.

Requirements

The below requirements are needed on the host that executes this module.

  • psutil(python module)

Parameters

Parameter

Comments

ignore_case

boolean

added in community.general 3.0.0

Ignore case in pattern if using the pattern option.

Choices:

  • false ← (default)
  • true

name

string

The name of the process(es) you want to get PID(s) for.

pattern

string

added in community.general 3.0.0

The pattern (regular expression) to match the process(es) you want to get PID(s) for.

Attributes

Attribute

Support

Description

check_mode

Support: full

Can run in check_mode and return changed status prediction without modifying target.

diff_mode

Support: none

Will return details on what has changed (or possibly needs changing in check_mode), when in diff mode.

Examples

# Pass the process name
- name: Getting process IDs of the process
  community.general.pids:
    name: python
  register: pids_of_python

- name: Printing the process IDs obtained
  ansible.builtin.debug:
    msg: "PIDS of python:{{pids_of_python.pids|join(',')}}"

- name: Getting process IDs of processes matching pattern
  community.general.pids:
    pattern: python(2(\.7)?|3(\.6)?)?\s+myapp\.py
  register: myapp_pids

Return Values

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

Key

Description

pids

list / elements=string

Process IDs of the given process.

Returned: list of none, one, or more process IDs

Sample: [100, 200]

Authors

  • Saranya Sridharan (@saranyasridharan)

© 2012–2018 Michael DeHaan
© 2018–2025 Red Hat, Inc.
Licensed under the GNU General Public License version 3.
https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/latest/collections/community/general/pids_module.html