The av agent that GP refers to is a script that runs periodically on target hosts to pull the latest configuration using Git. Ansible has a Python dependency but no agent running on target hosts, instead relying on SSH to push configuration changes.

Ideally, I’d like to see a configuration tool that uses Ansible’s SSH push model but without the Python dependency.

Strictly speaking, shouldn't it be possible to bodge ansible to send and execute a static python interpreter to bootstrap a host? I've been bitten by "oh no, that Python's too old" or similar several times now. The idea of bootstrapping from only having a `sh` on the far end seems like it ought to be a thing, but (for instance) mitogen only goes part-way.

There was a pen-test tool designed on these lines once called Mosquito Lisp, which as far as I can see evolved into something called WaspVM: https://github.com/swdunlop/WaspVM I have no idea if it's in use, alive, or even working these days.

Is anyone working on this side of the problem and I've missed it?

If python is considered an agent, isn't bash now an agent?

It doesn't need any python. Ansible opens a regular ssh session and can run anything from it - including python if available.

you can use the "raw" module without python.