amazon s3 - ansible include with array slices -

in ansible 2.2, want loop on large list of files read s3.

here role/tasks/main.yml

   - name: simulate variable read s3     set_fact:       list_of_files_to_import: [         "a.tar.gz",         "b.tar.gz",         "c.tar.gz",         "d.tar.gz",         "e.tar.gz",         "f.tar.gz",         "g.tar.gz",         "h.tar.gz",         ...         "zz.tar.gz"       ]    - name: process each file s3     include: submodule.yml     with_items: list_of_files_to_import 

here role/tasks/submodule.yml

 ---   - name: restore table {{ item }}     debug: var={{ item }} 

this crashes because there many files.

i have found can slice array , send sections @ time:

   - name: process each file s3     include: submodule.yml     with_items: "{{ list_of_files_to_import[0:5] }}"    - name: process each file s3     include: submodule.yml     with_items: "{{ list_of_files_to_import[5:10] }}"    - name: process each file s3     include: submodule.yml     with_items: "{{ list_of_files_to_import[10:15] }}"    - name: process each file s3     include: submodule.yml     with_items: "{{ list_of_files_to_import[15:20] }}" 

instead of hardcoding these little blocks, wanted try like

   - name: process each file s3     include: submodule.yml     with_items: "{{ list_of_files_to_import[{{start}}:{{end}}] }}" 

but cannot variable-defined variable names

how can process large list of items in ansible 2.2?

i ended solving shell script, repeatedly calling playbook --extra-vars specify files process.

this works because list of files in s3 have similar filenames. loops through filenames , processes each 1 @ time.

 #!/usr/bin/env bash  # return 0(true) if year/month combination valid valid() {    yr=$1    mn=$2    # not run on months after month    if [ "$yr" -eq "2017" -a "$mn" -gt "$(date +%m)" ]         return 1    fi     return 0 }  # every year 2002 year year in `seq 2002 $(date +%y)`    # every zero-padded month, 01-12    month in `seq -f "%02g" 01 12`          # each type of item in inventory       object in widgets doodads                 if valid $year $month;                        ansible-playbook playbook_name.yml --extra-vars "object=$object year=$year month=$month"           else              echo skipping invalid combo $object $year $month           fi       done    done done