List the 10 hosts in an inventory group, then run a playbook that targets that group with a package task (apt/yum) to ensure nginx is present. Ansible runs it in parallel over SSH, idempotently.

Detailed Answer

The strength here is idempotency and parallelism: state=present installs only where missing, and re-running is safe. Use the generic package module or the OS-specific one, add a handler to start/enable the service, and template the config. Scaling from 10 to 1000 servers is just a bigger inventory — the playbook does not change.

Code Example

- hosts: web
  become: true
  tasks:
    - name: Install nginx
      ansible.builtin.package:
        name: nginx
        state: present
    - name: Ensure nginx running
      ansible.builtin.service: { name: nginx, state: started, enabled: true }

💡

Interview Tip

Stress idempotency and that scaling to more hosts just means a bigger inventory — the playbook is unchanged.

ansibleplaybooknginx

New to Ansible? Start with the Ansible: Zero to Hero guide.

Read the tutorial →

How would you install nginx on 10 servers using Ansible?

More Ansible questions