[Bug] NoneType crash in inventory plugins when VM fields are explicitly None

[abhinavbansal29]

Describe the bug

All three inventory plugins crash with 'NoneType' object has no attribute 'get' when processing VMs (or hosts) that have fields like ownership_info, project, or cluster set to None in the API response.

The root cause is the use of dict.get("key", {}).get(...) throughout the inventory plugins. In Python, dict.get("key", {}) only returns the default {} when the key is missing from the dict. If the key exists but its value is explicitly None (as returned by the SDK's to_dict()), Python returns None — and the subsequent .get() call fails.

Affected files:

• plugins/inventory/ntnx_prism_vm_inventory_v2.py (6 locations)
• plugins/inventory/ntnx_prism_vm_inventory.py (8 locations)
• plugins/inventory/ntnx_prism_host_inventory_v2.py (6 locations)

To Reproduce

1. Create a VM with minimal configuration (no description, no project, no ownership):

- name: Create minimal VM
  nutanix.ncp.ntnx_vms:
    nutanix_host: "{{ nutanix_host }}"
    nutanix_username: "{{ nutanix_username }}"
    nutanix_password: "{{ nutanix_password }}"
    validate_certs: false
    state: present
    name: "test-vm-minimal"
    cluster:
      uuid: "{{ cluster_uuid }}"
    vcpus: 1
    cores_per_vcpu: 1
    memory_gb: 1

2. Run the inventory plugin:

ansible-inventory -i nutanix.yml --graph -vvv

3. The plugin crashes when iterating over VMs because the SDK returns fields like ownership_info: None, project: None in the VM dict.

Stack trace

[WARNING]: Failed to parse inventory with
  'ansible_collections.nutanix.ncp.plugins.inventory.ntnx_prism_vm_inventory_v2'
  plugin: 'NoneType' object has no attribute 'get'

Failed to parse inventory with
  'ansible_collections.nutanix.ncp.plugins.inventory.ntnx_prism_vm_inventory_v2' plugin.

<<< caused by >>>
'NoneType' object has no attribute 'get'

Crash locations

ntnx_prism_vm_inventory_v2.py

# line 621
cluster_ext_id = vm.get("cluster", {}).get("ext_id")  # crashes if cluster is None

# line 636-637
owner_ext_id = vm.get("ownership_info", {}).get("owner", {}).get("ext_id")  # crashes if ownership_info is None
project_ext_id = vm.get("project", {}).get("ext_id")  # crashes if project is None

# line 390-393 (_resolve_custom_ansible_host)
vm.get("cluster", {}).get("ext_id")  # crashes if cluster is None

# line 599 (parse)
for cluster in list_clusters.data:  # crashes if data is None

ntnx_prism_vm_inventory.py

# line 234-238
cluster = entity.get("status", {}).get("cluster_reference", {}).get("name")  # crashes if status is None
vm_resources = entity.get("status", {}).get("resources", {}).copy()  # crashes if status is None

# line 306-311
entity.get("metadata", {}).get("categories")  # crashes if metadata is None

# line 328-330
filter_vars.update(entity.get("status", {}))  # crashes if status is None

# line 437
entity.get("metadata", {}).get("project_reference", {})  # crashes if metadata is None

ntnx_prism_host_inventory_v2.py

# line 343-351
hypervisor = host.get("hypervisor", {})  # returns None if hypervisor key exists with None value
external_addr = hypervisor.get("external_address", {})  # crashes

controller_vm = host.get("controller_vm", {})  # same issue
external_addr = controller_vm.get("external_address", {})  # crashes

# line 507-508
cluster_ext_id = host.get("cluster", {}).get("uuid")  # crashes if cluster is None
cluster_name = host.get("cluster", {}).get("name")  # crashes if cluster is None

Expected behavior

The inventory plugins should gracefully handle None values for nested fields and continue processing VMs/hosts without crashing.

Fix

Replace all unsafe dict.get("key", {}).get(...) patterns with (dict.get("key") or {}).get(...). The or {} ensures None values are coerced to an empty dict before the chained .get() call.

Example:

# Before (crashes when ownership_info is None)
owner_ext_id = vm.get("ownership_info", {}).get("owner", {}).get("ext_id")

# After (safe)
owner_ext_id = ((vm.get("ownership_info") or {}).get("owner") or {}).get("ext_id")

Proof:

>>> vm = {"ownership_info": None, "project": None, "cluster": None}

>>> # OLD CODE - crashes
>>> vm.get("ownership_info", {}).get("owner", {}).get("ext_id")
AttributeError: 'NoneType' object has no attribute 'get'

>>> # NEW CODE - safe
>>> ((vm.get("ownership_info") or {}).get("owner") or {}).get("ext_id")
None  # returns None gracefully

Additional context

• Affects nutanix.ncp collection version 2.4.0
• Reproduced with ansible-core 2.20.0 (Python 3.13) and ansible-core 2.16.0 (Python 3.10)
• The issue manifests when VMs are created with minimal configuration (common in automated/test environments) or when the PC returns None for optional nested fields
• All 3 inventory plugins (ntnx_prism_vm_inventory, ntnx_prism_vm_inventory_v2, ntnx_prism_host_inventory_v2) are affected by the same pattern