What do you like about ansible? I guess it abstracts away the need to check for OS/init system? How else does it help in place of shell scripts?

Also after using NixOS, it's amazing what NixOS does and disappointing that ansible is not so great for deterministic config [^ansible_drawback], its more or less a batch of commands executed together. The closest thing, to NixOS, I've been able to achieve is load a variables file in playbook.yml and enable/disable service or install/purge pkg based on variables declared. I might be nitpicking/wrong given I've not been using long enough but directory layout is kinda too verbose. I say that because it'll get really messy very quickly when writing modules for more services. NixOS is great, you only have to have configuration.nix or flake.nix+flake.lock too (if using flakes) and rest you can import however you like.

[^ansible_drawback]: I know that nix stores its state in /nix and ansible doesn't have any such assumption about the target host so it can't rollback to previous state