vagrant/website/docs/source/v2/provisioning/shell.html.md

page_title	sidebar_current
Shell Scripts - Provisioning	provisioning-shell

Shell Provisioner

Provisioner name: "shell"

The shell provisioner allows you to upload and execute a script as the root user within the guest machine.

Shell provisioning is ideal for users new to Vagrant who want to get up and running quickly and provides a strong alternative for users who aren't comfortable with a full configuration management system such as Chef or Puppet.

Inline Scripts

Perhaps the easiest way to get started is with an inline script. An inline script is a script that is given to Vagrant directly within the Vagrantfile. An example is best:

Vagrant.configure("2") do |config|
  config.vm.provision "shell",
    inline: "echo Hello, World"
end

This causes echo Hello, World to be run within the guest machine when provisioners are run.

Combined with a little bit more Ruby, this makes it very easy to embed your shell scripts directly within your Vagrantfile. Another example below:

$script = <<SCRIPT
echo I am provisioning...
date > /etc/vagrant_provisioned_at
SCRIPT

Vagrant.configure("2") do |config|
  config.vm.provision "shell", inline: $script
end

I understand if you're not familiar with Ruby, the above may seem very advanced or foreign. But don't fear, what it is doing is quite simple: the script is assigned to a global variable $script. This global variable contains a string which is then passed in as the inline script to the Vagrant configuration.

Of course, if any Ruby in your Vagrantfile outside of basic variable assignment makes you uncomfortable, you can use an actual script file, documented in the next section.

External Script

The shell provisioner can also take an option specifying a path to a shell script on the host machine. Vagrant will then upload this script into the guest and execute it. An example:

Vagrant.configure("2") do |config|
  config.vm.provision "shell", path: "script.sh"
end

Relative paths, such as above, are expanded relative to the location of the root Vagrantfile for your project. Absolute paths can also be used, as well as shortcuts such as ~ (home directory) and .. (parent directory).

Script Arguments

You can parameterize your scripts as well like any normal shell script. These arguments can be specified to the shell provisioner. They should be specified as a string as they'd be typed on the command line, so be sure to properly escape anything:

Vagrant.configure("2") do |config|
  config.vm.provision "shell" do |s|
    s.inline = "echo $1"
    s.args   = "'hello, world!'"
  end
end