Automating Ansible VMware with lookup dig - templates

Question

I'm currently trying to further automate VM automation by not having to include the IP address in the variables file. I found nslookup module with dig, but feel I'm going about this the wrong way, for example here is variables file which is read upon creation for details:
# VMware Launch Variables
# If this is a test deployment you must ensure the vm is terminated after use.
vmname: agent5
esxi_datacenter: Datacenter
esxi_cluster: Cluster
esxi_datastore: ds1 # Do not change value.
esxi_template: template-v2
esxi_folder: agents # Folder must be pre-created
# Static IP Addresses
esxi_static_ip: "{{ lookup('dig', '{{ vmname }}.example.com.') }}"
esxi_netmask: 255.255.252.0
esxi_gateway: 10.0.0.1
What I was hoping to do with these was just to have the "esxi_static_ip" but pulled on the fly from a lookup with dig. This, however, in its current state does not work.
What is happening is either the VM launches without an ipv4 address or more often it fails with the following error:
fatal: [localhost -> localhost]: FAILED! => {"changed": false, "msg": "Failed to create a virtual machine : A specified parameter was not correct: spec.nicSettingMap.adapter.ip.ipAddress"}
I get the IP and pass it along, which works when I hard code the esxi_static_ip: in my vmware-lanch-vars.yml file. However, if I use (including the examples) it fails.
The newvm is registered when I run my vmware_guest playbook.
- name: Make virtual machine IP persistant
set_fact:
newvm_ip_address: '{{ newvm.instance.ipv4 }}'
- name: Add host to in memory inventory
add_host:
hostname: "{{ newvm_ip_address }}"
groups: just_created
newvm_ip_address: "{{ newvm.instance.ipv4 }}"
When I run with -vvvv I can see no IP is being attached:
"networks": [
{
"device_type": "vmxnet3",
"gateway": "0.0.0.01",
"ip": "",
"name": "Network",
"netmask": "255.255.252.0",
"type": "static"
}
],
UPDATE 3
When I created a simple playbook it works, just not when I put it into my regular flow, this below works:
---
- hosts: localhost
vars:
vmname: "apim-sb-ng1-agent2"
vm_dig_fqdn: "{{ vmname }}.example.com."
esxi_static_ip: "{{ lookup('dig', vm_dig_fqdn) }}"
tasks:
- debug: msg="{{ esxi_static_ip }}"

Answer 1

I am not sure this is the first problem your are facing (see my comment above), but your jinja2 template expression is wrong.
You cannot use jinja2 expression expansion while already inside a jinja2 expression expansion.
In this case, you have to concatenate your variable and string with the + operator:
esxi_static_ip: "{{ lookup('dig', vmname + '.example.com.') }}"
If your prefer to use jinja2 expansion everywhere, you can separate this in different variables, e.g.:
vm_dig_fqdn: "{{ vmname }}.example.com."
esxi_static_ip: "{{ lookup('dig', vm_dig_fqdn) }}"