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posts/archive/ansible-3.0.0-qa.md

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+---
+author: The Ansible Community Team
+date: 2021-02-18 00:00 UTC
+description: Answering the most common questions we have received about the Ansible 3.0.0 release.
+lang: en-us
+title: Ansible 3.0.0 Q&A
+---
+
+# Ansible 3.0.0 Q&A
+
+The Ansible community team has
+[announced the release of Ansible 3.0.0](https://www.ansible.com/blog/announcing-the-community-ansible-3.0.0-package)
+and here are the questions about the release that we've heard from
+community members so far. If you have a question that is not answered
+below, let us know on the [mailing lists or IRC](https://www.ansible.com/community).
+
+**How can I stay up to date with changes in the Ansible community?**
+
+Subscribe to the [ansible-announce mailing list](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/ansible-announce)
+for release announcements and to the [Bullhorn newsletter](https://us19.campaign-archive.com/home/?u=56d874e027110e35dea0e03c1&id=d6635f5420)
+for community news. The Bullhorn is distributed every two weeks with key dates and updates. You may also consider
+[registering for the Ansible contributor summit](https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ansible-contributor-summit-202103-registration-141735886853)
+on March 9, 2021.
+
+## About the Ansible community package and ansible-base/ansible-core
+
+**Are there any changes to the Ansible language in 3.0.0?**
+
+There are no significant changes since the Ansible 3.0.0 package depends on the same version of ansible-base as Ansible 2.10.x.
+
+**Why are the versions of ansible-base/ansible-core packages diverging from the Ansible package?**
+
+When the Ansible Community Team set out to restructure the Ansible project, Ansible was split into the following components: 
+
+- The core engine, modules and plugins
+- Community and partner supported Ansible Collections of modules and plugins
+
+The former became known as ansible-base, soon to be
+[ansible-core](https://github.com/ansible/ansible/blob/devel/docs/docsite/rst/roadmap/ROADMAP_2_11.rst).
+The latter became additions on top of the core, available either ad-hoc
+or as part of the Ansible community package, which includes a set of
+curated and maintained Collections.
+
+Semantic versioning of the Ansible package will let us signal
+backwards-compatibility as well as breaking changes in the included
+Collections independently of the core engine.
+
+Because these are different components and different things, it is
+appropriate for them to be versioned independently from each other.
+
+**Will ansible-base/ansible-core also adopt semantic versioning?**
+
+No, the team managing ansible-core does not currently plan to adopt semantic versioning.
+
+**What is the correlation between Ansible 3.0.0 and ansible-base 2.10.x?**
+
+Ansible 3.0.0 is a package that includes over [85 Ansible Collections](https://github.com/ansible-community/ansible-build-data/blob/main/3/ansible-3.build).
+It doesn't include ansible-base: it *depends* on it and specifies a required version range such as *ansible-base>=2.10.6,<2.11* so that the appropriate core package gets installed automatically.
+For Ansible 4.0.0, this dependency will shift to *ansible-core>=2.11,<2.12* instead.
+
+ansible-base 2.10.x (as well as ansible-core in the near future) will continue to be available as a standalone package for users that prefer installing only the Collections they need.
+
+**How is the range of included Collection versions established?**
+
+The release build tooling queries the latest version of included Collections and determines the upper-limit based on that version.
+
+For example, if a collection's version is 1.5, the range would be *>=1.5,<2.0*.
+If the collection's version is 2.3, the range would be *>=2.3,<3.0*.
+
+The general idea is to keep Collections within a single major version throughout the lifecycle of a single Ansible package major version.
+
+**What version will ansible --version return?**
+
+`ansible --version` will return the version of ansible-base, not the version of the Ansible package, because ansible-base is the one providing the ansible command.
+
+### Installing and upgrading
+
+**How can I install Ansible 3.0.0?**
+
+The Ansible 3.0.0 Community package is [released to PyPI](https://pypi.org/project/ansible/) and can be installed
+with `pip install ansible==3.0.0`.
+
+**Can I upgrade to Ansible 3.0.0 from previous versions of Ansible? If so which ones?**
+
+- To upgrade to Ansible-3.0 from Ansible-2.10: `pip install --upgrade ansible`.
+- To upgrade to Ansible-3.0 from Ansible-2.9 or earlier: `pip uninstall ansible`; `pip install ansible`.
+  This is due to a limitation in pip.
+
+Yes, but the command to upgrade is different depending on the version you have now.
+
+Ansible 3.0.0 is based on ansible-base 2.10, so playbook syntax remains
+the same between Ansible-2.10 and Ansible-3.0. However, there may be
+incompatibilities in some modules and plugins as Ansible-3.0.0 allows
+backwards-incompatible changes in Collections.
+
+**Will I be able to upgrade to Ansible 4.0.0 from Ansible 3.0.0?**
+
+Yes, but you will have to uninstall and reinstall again, due to
+the renaming of ansible-base to ansible-core: `pip uninstall ansible`; `pip install ansible`.
+
+Ansible 4.0.0 will be based on
+ansible-core 2.11, so playbook syntax in Ansible 4.0.0 may
+include backwards incompatible changes (ansible-core does not
+use semantic versioning, so updates to the minor version can
+contain backwards incompatible changes).  When Ansible 4.0.0 is
+ready to start its pre-release cycle, porting guides will be
+available to help guide you through those
+changes.
+
+### Release cadence and scope
+
+**What is the release cadence moving forward?**
+
+Minor version releases of the Ansible package (such as 3.1.0,
+3.2.0) are planned for every three weeks.  These releases will
+include new backwards-compatible features, modules and plugins
+as well as bug fixes.
+
+Major version releases of the Ansible package (such as 4.0.0,
+5.0.0) will happen after new releases of ansible-core. The
+Ansible 4.0.0 release is planned for May 2021, soon after the
+release of ansible-core 2.11 in April. After 4.0.0, a six month
+release cycle for major versions will become the normal cadence,
+with 5.0.0 releasing in November, trailing the planned 2.12
+release of ansible-core.
+
+**How much change will each minor and major version of Ansible contain?**
+
+Each minor release of the Ansible community package will accept
+only backwards-compatible changes in included Collections.
+Collections must also use semantic versioning, so the Collection
+version numbers will reflect this rule. For example, if Ansible
+3.0.0 releases with community.general 2.0.0, then all minor
+releases of Ansible 3.x (such as Ansible 3.1.0 or Ansible 3.5.0)
+would include a 2.x release of community.general (such as 2.8.0
+or 2.9.5).
+
+Each major release of the Ansible community package will accept
+the latest released version of each included Collection and may
+include the latest released version of ansible-core. Major
+releases of the Ansible community package can contain breaking
+changes in the modules and other plugins within the included
+Collections and/or in core features.
+
+**What changes will each patch release contain, given the use of semantic versioning here?**
+
+Patch releases will be used only when bugs are discovered that
+warrant a targeted fix for with a quick turnaround.  For
+instance, if a packaging bug is discovered in our release of
+3.1.0 that prevents Debian packages from being built, a 3.1.1
+release may occur the next day that fixes that issue. No new
+features are allowed in patch releases.
+
+### Packaging
+
+**Will Ansible 3.0.0 be made available as an upstream RPM?**
+
+No. RPM-based Linux distros, such as [Fedora](https://src.fedoraproject.org/rpms/ansible),
+have been creating superior RPM packages of Ansible for a while
+now. So we decided for Ansible-2.10 and ansible-base-2.10, the
+Ansible project would no longer provide pre-built RPMs.
+
+**Will Ansible 3.0.0 be available on Ubuntu Launchpad?**
+
+Yes. The Ansible Community Team is catching up to the changes
+in how the Ansible content is packaged but plan to have releases
+in the PPA soon.  The team is currently testing a new GitHub
+action to build the debs for the PPA.
+
+### Terminology
+
+- *The ansible package*
+
+An all-in-one software package (Python, deb, rpm, etc) that
+provides backwards compatibility with Ansible 2.9 by including
+modules and plugins that have since been migrated to Ansible
+Collections.
+
+The Ansible package depends on ansible-base (soon ansible-core).
+So when you do pip install ansible, pip installs ansible-base
+automatically.
+
+Ansible 3.0.0 contains more Collections thanks to the wider
+Ansible community reviewing Collections against the community
+checklist. This list of what's included can be found at
+[ansible-build-data](https://github.com/ansible-community/ansible-build-data/tree/master/2.10).
+
+- *Collection*
+
+A packaging format for bundling and distributing Ansible
+content: plugins, roles, modules, playbooks, documentation and
+more. Can be released independent of other Collections or
+ansible-base so features and bug
+fixes can be made available sooner to users.
+    Installed from source repositories, from
+[galaxy.ansible.com](https://galaxy.ansible.com/) via
+`ansible-galaxy collection install <namespace.collection>` or using a [requirements.yml file](https://galaxy.ansible.com/docs/using/installing.html#installing-multiple-roles-from-a-file).
+
+- *ansible-base*
+
+New for 2.10. The codebase that is now contained in
+`github.com/ansible/ansible` for the Ansible 2.10 release. It
+contains a minimal amount of modules and plugins and allows
+other Collections to be installed. Similar to Ansible 2.9 though
+without any content that has since moved into a Collection.
+
+Renamed to ansible-core in the devel branch of Ansible and will
+be released under that name from version 2.11 onwards.
+
+- *Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform*
+
+The commercially available enterprise offering from Red Hat,
+combining multiple Ansible focused projects, including
+ansible-core, awx, galaxy_ng, Collections and various Red Hat
+tools focused on an integrated Ansible user experience.