How do I add a label to the GitLab pipelines when they run?
This would be extremely helpful when you run a few nightly (scheduled) pipelines for different configurations on the main branch. For example, we run a nightly main branch with several submodules, each set at a point in their development (a commit point SHA) and I want to label that 'MAIN'. We run a second pipeline that I want to label 'HEADs', which is a result of pulling all of the HEAD's of the submodule to see if changes will break the main trunk when they are merged in.
Currently it shows:
Last commit message.
Pipeline #
commit SHA
Branch name
'Scheduled'
That is helpful, but it is very difficult to tell them apart because only the pipeline # changes between the pipelines.
I have good news!!
Our friends at GitLab have been working on this feature. There is now a way to label your pipeline in release 15.5.1-ee.0!
It uses the workflow control with a new keyword name
workflow:
name: 'Pipeline for branch: $CI_COMMIT_BRANCH'
You can even use the workflow:rules pair to have different names for you pipeline:
variables:
PIPELINE_NAME: 'Default pipeline name'
workflow:
name: '$PIPELINE_NAME'
rules:
- if: '$CI_PIPELINE_SOURCE == "merge_request_event"'
variables:
PIPELINE_NAME: 'MR pipeline: $CI_COMMIT_BRANCH'
- if: '$CI_MERGE_REQUEST_LABELS =~ /pipeline:run-in-ruby3/'
variables:
PIPELINE_NAME: 'Ruby 3 pipeline'
Find the docs here: https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/ci/yaml/#workflow
This feature is disabled by default in 15.5 because it is so new.
You can enable the feature flag, which is named pipeline_name.
See this link to enable: https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/administration/feature_flags.html
(You need to use the Rails Console to enable it. Pretty easy.)
Note: Remember that the workflow keyword affects the entire pipeline instance.
This seems to be officially supported with GitLab 15.7 (December 2022)
Add custom names to pipelines with workflow:name:
For some projects, the same pipeline can be configured to run differently for different variables or conditions, creating very distinct outcomes for successful pipelines.
It can be hard for you to determine which version of that pipeline ran since there is no indication about the inputs used for that particular run.
While labels like scheduled and API help, it is sometimes still difficult to identify specific pipelines.
Now you can set a pipeline name using the keyword workflow:name to better identify the pipeline with string, a CI/CD variable, or a combination of both.
See Documentation and Issue.
Note:
If the name is an empty string, the pipeline is not assigned a name.
A name consisting of only CI/CD variables could evaluate to an empty string if all the variables are also empty.
Related
I have a few use cases in my Gitlab setup I would like to be able to support:
If a certain label (let's call it “skip_build”) is set, the deployment steps should not be run when I merge an MR to a main branch. This would be useful when we have multiple MRs being merged right after another and only need the last one built.
If another label (we'll call it “skip_tests”) is set, I should be able to read it as an env var from within the script and alter the flow within the script accordingly (using normal bash syntax), e.g. to alter the package command parameters used a bit. This is useful for small changes where it might not make sense to run a lengthy test suite.
Is this possible with Gitlab, and if so, how?
I’ve tried experimenting with CI_MERGE_REQUEST_LABELS, but it doesn’t seem to be able to read that as an env var from within the script.
You have to use merge request pipelines for the CI_MERGE_REQUEST_LABELS variable (and other MR-related variables) to be present as documented in predefined variables.
You could use a rules: clause to skip jobs. Something like
build:
rules: # only run this job if the regex pattern does not match
- if: $CI_MERGE_REQUEST_LABELS !~ /skip_build/
You can also do this on any other kind of predefined (or user-defined) variable, like branch name, commit messages, MR titles, etc. Whatever works for you.
For example, a built in feature of GitLab is that if your commit message contains [ci skip] it will prevent the pipeline from running. You could implement similar functionality for your jobs and/or pipelines through rules: or workflow:rules:.
I have a multi-module build with one "leading" module and one additional one. I have set things up so that the additional module is only built when either it or the build files have changed:
build:sbt:module-main:
extends: .build-sbt
build:sbt:module-a:
extends: .build-sbt
only:
changes:
- module-a/**/*
- project/**/*
- "*.yml"
- "*.sbt
The behaviour I observe is that in a pipeline resulting from pushing a new branch, both modules are always built, regardless of the actual changes. Then when new commits are pushed to the branch, the pipelines triggered off of those will behave according to my rule, i.e. module-a will only be built when there was a change that affects it.
I would expect the same behaviour from the start.
I assume that "change" means "what git thinks has changed between this branch and the branch it was based off of". Is that not what change means in this context?
While searching for another answer I discovered by accident that Gitlab is working as designed in this case.
I would like to check if a branch is a tag or not in a single stage in gitlab-ci.yml. Then based on whether a branch is a tag or not, a specific set of commands are executed:
IF tag:
A SET OF COMMANDS
ELSE:
ANOTHER SET OF COMMAND
I am aware that only: -tags can be used to check if a branch is a tag, but how can I check the branch and then apply different sets of commands based on the branch type in a single gitlab-ci stage? In this case, if a branch is not a tag, I would to apply a different set of commands.
some_stage:
only:
- tags
script:
- | SET OF COMMANDS
You can use Gitlab-CI predefined variables:
CI_COMMIT_BRANCH (The commit branch name. Available in branch pipelines, including pipelines for the default branch. Not available in merge request pipelines or tag pipelines.)
CI_COMMIT_TAG (The commit tag name. Available only in pipelines for tags.)
The "CI_COMMIT_BRANCH" variable will hold the branch name only if pipeline is triggered from branch, otherwise it will not hold any value.
The same applies on the "CI_COMMIT_TAG" variable that will hold values only in case of pipeline triggered from tag.
You can use rules to check these variables and decide if you want to execute a job or not.
for example, if you want to build docker images from tags only:
build_docker:
rules:
- if: '$CI_COMMIT_TAG != null && $CI_BUILD_TAG =~ *SOME_REGEX*'
when: on_success
Update: Or you can use variable inside script to do you check but i recommend that you split the logic into to jobs. one for tags work and another for branch job. and specify with rules when a job is executed.
last thing: there is a deprecated tag called CI_BUILD_TAG, so if you are using an old version of gitlab.
I have a GitLab CI pipeline with a 'migration' job which I want to be added only if certain files changed between current commit and master branch, but in my current project I'm forced to use GitLab CI pipelines for push event which complicates things.
Docs on rules:changes clearly states that it will glitch and will not work properly without MR (my case of push event), so that's out of question.
Docs on rules:if states that it only works with env variables. But docs on passing CI/CD variables to another job clearly states that
These variables cannot be used as CI/CD variables to configure a
pipeline, but they can be used in job scripts.
So, now I'm stuck. I can just skip running the job in question overriding the script and checking for file changes, but what I want is not adding the job in question to pipeline in first place.
While you can't add a job alone to a pipeline based on the output of a script, you can add a child pipeline dynamically based on the script output. The method of using rules: with dynamic variables won't work because rules: are evaluated at the time the pipeline is created, as you found in the docs.
However, you can achieve the same effect using dynamic child-pipelines feature. The idea is you dynamically create the YAML for the desired pipeline in a job. That YAML created by your job will be used to create a child pipeline, which your pipeline can depend on.
Sadly, to add/remove a Gitlab job based on variables created from a previous job is not possible for a given pipeline
A way to achieve this is if your break your current pipeline to an upstream and downstream
The upstream will have 2 jobs
The first one will use your script to define a variable
This job will trigger the downstream, passing this variable
Upstream
check_val:
...
script:
... Script imposes the logic with the needed checks
... If true
- echo "MY_CONDITIONAL_VAR=true" >> var.env
... If false
- echo "MY_CONDITIONAL_VAR=false" >> var.env
artifacts:
reports:
dotenv: var.env
trigger_your_original_pipeline:
...
variables:
MY_CONDITIONAL_VAR: "$MY_CONDITIONAL_VAR"
trigger:
project: "project_namespance/project"
The downstream would be your original pipeline
Downstream
...
migration:
...
rules:
- if: '$MY_CONDITIONAL_VAR == "true"'
Now the MY_CONDITIONAL_VAR will be available at the start of the pipeline, so you can impose rules to add or not the migration job
In my pipeline, I'd like to have a job run only if the Merge Requests target branch is a certain branch, say master or release.
Is this possible?
I've read through https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/ci/variables/ and unless I missed something, I'm not seeing anything that can help.
Update: 2019-03-21
GitLab has variables for merge request info since version 11.6 (https://docs.gitlab.com/ce/ci/variables/ see the variables start with CI_MERGE_REQUEST_). But, these variables are only available in merge request pipelines.(https://docs.gitlab.com/ce/ci/merge_request_pipelines/index.html)
To configure a CI job for merge requests, we have to set:
only:
- merge_requests
And then we can use CI_MERGE_REQUEST_* variables in those jobs.
The biggest pitfall here is only: merge_request has complete different behavior from normal only/except parameters.
usual only/except parameters:
(https://docs.gitlab.com/ce/ci/yaml/README.html#onlyexcept-basic)
only defines the names of branches and tags for which the job will run.
except defines the names of branches and tags for which the job will not run.
only: merge_request: (https://docs.gitlab.com/ce/ci/merge_request_pipelines/index.html#excluding-certain-jobs)
The behavior of the only: merge_requests parameter is such that only jobs with that parameter are run in the context of a merge request; no other jobs will be run.
I felt hard to reorganize jobs to make them work like before with only: merge_request exists on any job. Thus I'm still using the one-liner in my original answer to get MR info in a CI job.
Original answer:
No.
But GitLab have a plan for this feature in 2019 Q2: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/23902#final-assumptions
Currently, we can use a workaround to achieve this. The method is as Rekovni's answer described, and it actually works.
There's a simple one-liner, get the target branch of an MR from the current branch:
script: # in any script section of gitlab-ci.yml
- 'CI_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME=$(curl -LsS -H "PRIVATE-TOKEN: $AWESOME_GITLAB_API_TOKEN" "https://my.gitlab-instance.com/api/v4/projects/$CI_PROJECT_ID/merge_requests?source_branch=$CI_COMMIT_REF_NAME" | jq --raw-output ".[0].target_branch")'
Explanation:
CI_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME is a newly defined variable which stores resolved target branch name. Defining a variable is not necessary for various usage.
AWESOME_GITLAB_API_TOKEN is the variable configured in repository's CI/CD variable config. It is a GitLab personal access token(created in User Settings) with api scope.
About curl options: -L makes curl aware of HTTP redirections. -sS makes curl silent(-s) but show(-S) errors. -H specifies authority info accessing GitLab API.
The used API could be founded in https://docs.gitlab.com/ce/api/merge_requests.html#list-project-merge-requests. We use the source_branch attribute to figure out which MR current pipeline is running on. Thus, if a source branch has multiple MR to different target branch, you may want to change the part after | and do your own logic.
About jq(https://stedolan.github.io/jq/), it's a simple CLI util to deal with JSON stuff(what GitLab API returns). You could use node -p or any method you want.
Because of the new env variables in 11.6 $CI_MERGE_REQUEST_SOURCE_BRANCH_NAME and $CI_MERGE_REQUEST_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME jobs can be included or excluded based on the source or target branch.
Using the only and except (complex) expressions, we can build a rule to filter merge requests. For a couple examples:
Merge request where the target branch is master:
only:
refs:
- merge_requests
variables:
- $CI_MERGE_REQUEST_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME == "master"
Merge request except if the source branch is master or release:
only:
- merge_requests
except:
variables:
- $CI_MERGE_REQUEST_SOURCE_BRANCH_NAME == "master"
- $CI_MERGE_REQUEST_SOURCE_BRANCH_NAME == "release"
If you want to use multiple refs (let's say merge_requests and tags) and multiple variables, the refs will be OR'd, the variables will be OR'd, and the result will be AND'd:
If any of the conditions in variables evaluates to truth when using only, a new job is going to be created. If any of the expressions evaluates to truth when except is being used, a job is not going to be created.
If you use multiple keys under only or except, they act as an AND. The logic is:
(any of refs) AND (any of variables) AND (any of changes) AND (if kubernetes is active)
Variable expressions are also quite primitive, only supporting equality and (basic) regex. Because the variables will be OR'd you cannot specify both a source and target branch as of gitlab 11.6, just one or the other.
As of GitLab 11.6, there is CI_MERGE_REQUEST_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME.
If this is what you're really after, there could be an extremely convoluted way (untested) you could achieve this using the merge request API and CI variables.
With a workflow / build step something like:
Create merge request from feature/test to master
Start a build
Using the API (in a script), grab all open merge requests from the current project using CI_PROJECT_ID variable, and filter by source_branch and target_branch.
If there is a merge request open with the source_branch and target_branch being feature/test and master respectively, continue with the build, otherwise just skip the rest of the build.
For using the API, I don't believe you can use the CI_JOB_TOKEN variable to authenticate, so you'll probably need to create your own personal access token and store it as a CI variable to use in the build job.
Hope this helps!
Another example, but using rules:
rules:
# pipeline should run on merge request to master branch
- if: $CI_PIPELINE_SOURCE == 'merge_request_event' && $CI_MERGE_REQUEST_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME == 'master'
when: always
# pipeline should run on merge request to release branch
- if: $CI_PIPELINE_SOURCE == 'merge_request_event' && $CI_MERGE_REQUEST_TARGET_BRANCH_NAME == 'release'
when: always
- when: never
Gitlab CI is agnostic of Merge Requests (for now). Since the pipeline runs on the origin branch you will not be able to retrieve the destination.