Ansible 2.3.1 - sshpass Error

As you may or may not be aware, Ansible 2.3.1.0 was recently released. After installing Ansible 2.3.1.0 in my Python virtual environment I immediately ran into an issue that I had not seen. My host machine that I am running Ansible from is a MacBook Pro running Sierra so YMMV. Of course once I saw this I immediately activated my Ansible 2.3.0.0 environment and sure enough the issue was not present.

ansible-playbook -i inventory playbooks/kvm.yml --vault-password-file ~/.vault_pass --user remote

PLAY [kvm_hosts] *****************************************************************************************************************************************************************

TASK [Gathering Facts] ***********************************************************************************************************************************************************
fatal: [ms-7693.etsbv.internal]: FAILED! => {"failed": true, "msg": "to use the 'ssh' connection type with passwords, you must install the sshpass program"}
fatal: [nas01.etsbv.internal]: FAILED! => {"failed": true, "msg": "to use the 'ssh' connection type with passwords, you must install the sshpass program"}
fatal: [nas02.etsbv.internal]: FAILED! => {"failed": true, "msg": "to use the 'ssh' connection type with passwords, you must install the sshpass program"}
    to retry, use: --limit @./.retry/kvm.retry

PLAY RECAP ***********************************************************************************************************************************************************************
ms-7693.etsbv.internal     : ok=0    changed=0    unreachable=0    failed=1
nas01.etsbv.internal       : ok=0    changed=0    unreachable=0    failed=1
nas02.etsbv.internal       : ok=0    changed=0    unreachable=0    failed=1
```bash

So how do we fix this? Actually quite easy. However, we need to build
**sshpass** and install it from source.

So let's get that downloaded, built and installed.

```bash
cd ~/Downloads
wget https://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/sshpass/sshpass/1.06/sshpass-1.06.tar.gz
tar zxvf sshpass-1.06.tar.gz
cd sshpass-1.06
./configure
make
sudo make install
```bash

Now let's validate that **sshpass** is indeed installed now.

```bash
sshpass
Usage: sshpass [-f|-d|-p|-e] [-hV] command parameters
   -f filename   Take password to use from file
   -d number     Use number as file descriptor for getting password
   -p password   Provide password as argument (security unwise)
   -e            Password is passed as env-var "SSHPASS"
   With no parameters - password will be taken from stdin

   -P prompt     Which string should sshpass search for to detect a password prompt
   -v            Be verbose about what you're doing
   -h            Show help (this screen)
   -V            Print version information
At most one of -f, -d, -p or -e should be used
```bash

And sure enough, there it is now.

So now let's attempt to run our Ansible playbook once again.

**SUCCESS!!!!**

If you happen to be a macOS user and use [Homebrew](https://brew.sh/) you might
want to do the following instead to make cleanup and etc. easier:

```bash
brew create https://sourceforge.net/projects/sshpass/files/sshpass/1.06/sshpass-1.06.tar.gz --force
```bash

Now if you were using a **Linux** host such as **Ubuntu**, this would
have been as easy as:

```bash
sudo apt-get install sshpass

Interested in using Python virtual environments for Ansible regression testing? Here is a script to help you with that.

Enjoy!