This document describes the usage of .gitlab-ci.yml, the file that is used by
GitLab Runner to manage your project's jobs.
From version 7.12, GitLab CI uses a YAML
file (.gitlab-ci.yml) for the project configuration. It is placed in the root
of your repository and contains definitions of how your project should be built.
If you want a quick introduction to GitLab CI, follow our
quick start guide.
NOTE: Note:
If you have a mirrored repository where GitLab pulls from,
you may need to enable pipeline triggering in your project's
Settings > Repository > Pull from a remote repository > Trigger pipelines for mirror updates.
Jobs
The YAML file defines a set of jobs with constraints stating when they should
be run. You can specify an unlimited number of jobs which are defined as
top-level elements with an arbitrary name and always have to contain at least
the script clause.
job1:
script: "execute-script-for-job1"
job2:
script: "execute-script-for-job2"
The above example is the simplest possible CI/CD configuration with two separate
jobs, where each of the jobs executes a different command.
Of course a command can execute code directly (./configure;make;make install)
or run a script (test.sh) in the repository.
Jobs are picked up by Runners and executed within the
environment of the Runner. What is important, is that each job is run
independently from each other.
Each job must have a unique name, but there are a few reserved keywords that
cannot be used as job names:
image
services
stages
types
before_script
after_script
variables
cache
A job is defined by a list of parameters that define the job behavior.
Keyword
Required
Description
script
yes
Defines a shell script which is executed by Runner
extends
no
Defines a configuration entry that this job is going to inherit from
image
no
Use docker image, covered in Using Docker Images
services
no
Use docker services, covered in Using Docker Images
stage
no
Defines a job stage (default: test)
type
no
Alias for stage
variables
no
Define job variables on a job level
only
no
Defines a list of git refs for which job is created
except
no
Defines a list of git refs for which job is not created
tags
no
Defines a list of tags which are used to select Runner
allow_failure
no
Allow job to fail. Failed job doesn't contribute to commit status
when
no
Define when to run job. Can be on_success, on_failure, always or manual
dependencies
no
Define other jobs that a job depends on so that you can pass artifacts between them
artifacts
no
Define list of job artifacts
cache
no
Define list of files that should be cached between subsequent runs
before_script
no
Override a set of commands that are executed before job
after_script
no
Override a set of commands that are executed after job
environment
no
Defines a name of environment to which deployment is done by this job
coverage
no
Define code coverage settings for a given job
retry
no
Define how many times a job can be auto-retried in case of a failure
extends
Introduced in GitLab 11.3.
extends defines an entry name that a job that uses extends is going to
inherit from.
It is an alternative to using YAML anchors and is a little
more flexible and readable:
.tests:
script: rake test
stage: test
only:
refs:
- branches
rspec:
extends: .tests
script: rake rspec
only:
variables:
- $RSPEC
In the example above, the rspec job is going to inherit from the .tests
template job. GitLab will perform a reverse deep merge, which means that it will
merge the rspec contents into .tests recursively, and this is going to result in
the following rspec job:
rspec:
script: rake rspec
stage: test
only:
refs:
- branches
variables:
- $RSPEC
.tests in this example is a hidden key, but it's
possible to inherit from regular jobs as well.
extends supports multi-level inheritance, however it is not recommended to
use more than three levels. The maximum nesting level that is supported is 10.
The following example has two levels of inheritance:
.tests:
only:
- pushes
.rspec:
extends: .tests
script: rake rspec
rspec 1:
variables:
RSPEC_SUITE: '1'
extends: .rspec
rspec 2:
variables:
RSPEC_SUITE: '2'
extends: .rspec
spinach:
extends: .tests
script: rake spinach
extends works across configuration files combined with include.
pages
pages is a special job that is used to upload static content to GitLab that
can be used to serve your website. It has a special syntax, so the two
requirements below must be met:
Any static content must be placed under a public/ directory
artifacts with a path to the public/ directory must be defined
The example below simply moves all files from the root of the project to the
public/ directory. The .public workaround is so cp doesn't also copy
public/ to itself in an infinite loop:
pages:
stage: deploy
script:
- mkdir .public
- cp -r * .public
- mv .public public
artifacts:
paths:
- public
only:
- master
Read more on GitLab Pages user documentation.
image and services
This allows to specify a custom Docker image and a list of services that can be
used for time of the job. The configuration of this feature is covered in
a separate document.
before_script and after_script
Introduced in GitLab 8.7 and requires GitLab Runner v1.2
before_script is used to define the command that should be run before all
jobs, including deploy jobs, but after the restoration of artifacts.
This can be an array or a multi-line string.
after_script is used to define the command that will be run after for all
jobs, including failed ones. This has to be an array or a multi-line string.
The before_script and the main script are concatenated and run in a single context/container.
The after_script is run separately, so depending on the executor, changes done
outside of the working tree might not be visible, e.g. software installed in the
before_script.
It's possible to overwrite the globally defined before_script and after_script
if you set it per-job:
before_script:
- global before script
job:
before_script:
- execute this instead of global before script
script:
- my command
after_script:
- execute this after my script
stages
stages is used to define stages that can be used by jobs and is defined
globally.
The specification of stages allows for having flexible multi stage pipelines.
The ordering of elements in stages defines the ordering of jobs' execution:
Jobs of the same stage are run in parallel.
Jobs of the next stage are run after the jobs from the previous stage
complete successfully.
Let's consider the following example, which defines 3 stages:
stages:
- build
- test
- deploy
First, all jobs of build are executed in parallel.
If all jobs of build succeed, the test jobs are executed in parallel.
If all jobs of test succeed, the deploy jobs are executed in parallel.
If all jobs of deploy succeed, the commit is marked as passed.
If any of the previous jobs fails, the commit is marked as failed and no
jobs of further stage are executed.
There are also two edge cases worth mentioning:
If no stages are defined in .gitlab-ci.yml, then the build,
test and deploy are allowed to be used as job's stage by default.
If a job doesn't specify a stage, the job is assigned the test stage.
stage
stage is defined per-job and relies on stages which is defined
globally. It allows to group jobs into different stages, and jobs of the same
stage are executed in parallel. For example:
stages:
- build
- test
- deploy
job 1:
stage: build
script: make build dependencies
job 2:
stage: build
script: make build artifacts
job 3:
stage: test
script: make test
job 4:
stage: deploy
script: make deploy
types
CAUTION: Deprecated:
types is deprecated, and could be removed in one of the future releases.
Use stages instead.
script
script is the only required keyword that a job needs. It's a shell script
which is executed by the Runner. For example:
job:
script: "bundle exec rspec"
This parameter can also contain several commands using an array:
job:
script:
- uname -a
- bundle exec rspec
Sometimes, script commands will need to be wrapped in single or double quotes.
For example, commands that contain a colon (:) need to be wrapped in quotes so
that the YAML parser knows to interpret the whole thing as a string rather than
a "key: value" pair. Be careful when using special characters:
:, {, }, [, ], ,, &, *, #, ?, |, -, <, >, =, !, %, @, `.
only and except (simplified)
only and except are two parameters that set a job policy to limit when
jobs are created:
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.
There are a few rules that apply to the usage of job policy:
only and except are inclusive. If both only and except are defined
in a job specification, the ref is filtered by only and except.
only and except allow the use of regular expressions.
only and except allow to specify a repository path to filter jobs for
forks.
In addition, only and except allow the use of special keywords:
Value
Description
branches
When a branch is pushed.
tags
When a tag is pushed.
api
When pipeline has been triggered by a second pipelines API (not triggers API).
external
When using CI services other than GitLab.
pipelines
For multi-project triggers, created using the API with CI_JOB_TOKEN.
pushes
Pipeline is triggered by a git push by the user.
schedules
For scheduled pipelines.
triggers
For pipelines created using a trigger token.
web
For pipelines created using Run pipeline button in GitLab UI (under your project's Pipelines).
In the example below, job will run only for refs that start with issue-,
whereas all branches will be skipped:
job:
# use regexp
only:
- /^issue-.*$/
# use special keyword
except:
- branches
In this example, job will run only for refs that are tagged, or if a build is
explicitly requested via an API trigger or a Pipeline Schedule:
job:
# use special keywords
only:
- tags
- triggers
- schedules
The repository path can be used to have jobs executed only for the parent
repository and not forks:
job:
only:
- branches@gitlab-org/gitlab-ce
except:
- master@gitlab-org/gitlab-ce
The above example will run job for all branches on gitlab-org/gitlab-ce,
except master.
only and except (complex)
refs and kubernetes policies introduced in GitLab 10.0
variables policy introduced in 10.7
changes policy introduced in 11.4
CAUTION: Warning:
This an alpha feature, and it it subject to change at any time without
prior notice!
Since GitLab 10.0 it is possible to define a more elaborate only/except job
policy configuration.
GitLab now supports both, simple and complex strategies, so it is possible to
use an array and a hash configuration scheme.
Four keys are now available: refs, kubernetes and variables and changes.
refs and kubernetes
Refs strategy equals to simplified only/except configuration, whereas
kubernetes strategy accepts only active keyword.
variables
variables keyword is used to define variables expressions. In other words
you can use predefined variables / project / group or
environment-scoped variables to define an expression GitLab is going to
evaluate in order to decide whether a job should be created or not.
See the example below. Job is going to be created only when pipeline has been
scheduled or runs for a master branch, and only if kubernetes service is
active in the project.
job:
only:
refs:
- master
- schedules
kubernetes: active
Examples of using variables expressions:
deploy:
script: cap staging deploy
only:
refs:
- branches
variables:
- $RELEASE == "staging"
- $STAGING
Another use case is exluding jobs depending on a commit message (added in 11.0):
end-to-end:
script: rake test:end-to-end
except:
variables:
- $CI_COMMIT_MESSAGE =~ /skip-end-to-end-tests/
Learn more about variables expressions on a separate page.
changes
Using changes keyword with only or except makes it possible to define if
a job should be created based on files modified by a git push event.
For example:
docker build:
script: docker build -t my-image:$CI_COMMIT_REF_SLUG .
only:
changes:
- Dockerfile
- docker/scripts/*
In the scenario above, if you are pushing multiple commits to GitLab to an
existing branch, GitLab creates and triggers docker build job, provided that
one of the commits contains changes to either:
The Dockerfile file.
Any of the files inside docker/scripts/ directory.
CAUTION: Warning:
There are some caveats when using this feature with new branches and tags. See
the section below.
Using changes with new branches and tags
If you are pushing a new branch or a new tag to GitLab, the policy
always evaluates to true and GitLab will create a job. This feature is not
connected with merge requests yet, and because GitLab is creating pipelines
before an user can create a merge request we don't know a target branch at
this point.
Without a target branch, it is not possible to know what the common ancestor is,
thus we always create a job in that case. This feature works best for stable
branches like master because in that case GitLab uses the previous commit
that is present in a branch to compare against the latest SHA that was pushed.
tags
tags is used to select specific Runners from the list of all Runners that are
allowed to run this project.
During the registration of a Runner, you can specify the Runner's tags, for
example ruby, postgres, development.
tags allow you to run jobs with Runners that have the specified tags
assigned to them:
job:
tags:
- ruby
- postgres
The specification above, will make sure that job is built by a Runner that
has both ruby AND postgres tags defined.
Tags are also a great way to run different jobs on different platforms, for
example, given an OS X Runner with tag osx and Windows Runner with tag
windows, the following jobs run on respective platforms:
windows job:
stage:
- build
tags:
- windows
script:
- echo Hello, %USERNAME%!
osx job:
stage:
- build
tags:
- osx
script:
- echo "Hello, $USER!"
allow_failure
allow_failure is used when you want to allow a job to fail without impacting
the rest of the CI suite. Failed jobs don't contribute to the commit status.
The default value is false.
When enabled and the job fails, the pipeline will be successful/green for all
intents and purposes, but a "CI build passed with warnings" message will be
displayed on the merge request or commit or job page. This is to be used by
jobs that are allowed to fail, but where failure indicates some other (manual)
steps should be taken elsewhere.
In the example below, job1 and job2 will run in parallel, but if job1
fails, it will not stop the next stage from running, since it's marked with
allow_failure: true:
job1:
stage: test
script:
- execute_script_that_will_fail
allow_failure: true
job2:
stage: test
script:
- execute_script_that_will_succeed
job3:
stage: deploy
script:
- deploy_to_staging
when
when is used to implement jobs that are run in case of failure or despite the
failure.
when can be set to one of the following values:
on_success - execute job only when all jobs from prior stages
succeed. This is the default.
on_failure - execute job only when at least one job from prior stages
fails.
always - execute job regardless of the status of jobs from prior stages.
manual - execute job manually (added in GitLab 8.10). Read about
manual actions below.
For example:
stages:
- build
- cleanup_build
- test
- deploy
- cleanup
build_job:
stage: build
script:
- make build
cleanup_build_job:
stage: cleanup_build
script:
- cleanup build when failed
when: on_failure
test_job:
stage: test
script:
- make test
deploy_job:
stage: deploy
script:
- make deploy
when: manual
cleanup_job:
stage: cleanup
script:
- cleanup after jobs
when: always
The above script will:
Execute cleanup_build_job only when build_job fails.
Always execute cleanup_job as the last step in pipeline regardless of
success or failure.
Allow you to manually execute deploy_job from GitLab's UI.
when:manual
Notes:
Introduced in GitLab 8.10.
Blocking manual actions were introduced in GitLab 9.0.
Protected actions were introduced in GitLab 9.2.
Manual actions are a special type of job that are not executed automatically,
they need to be explicitly started by a user. An example usage of manual actions
would be a deployment to a production environment. Manual actions can be started
from the pipeline, job, environment, and deployment views. Read more at the
environments documentation.
Manual actions can be either optional or blocking. Blocking manual actions will
block the execution of the pipeline at the stage this action is defined in. It's
possible to resume execution of the pipeline when someone executes a blocking
manual action by clicking a play button.
When a pipeline is blocked, it will not be merged if Merge When Pipeline Succeeds
is set. Blocked pipelines also do have a special status, called manual.
Manual actions are non-blocking by default. If you want to make manual action
blocking, it is necessary to add allow_failure: false to the job's definition
in .gitlab-ci.yml.
Optional manual actions have allow_failure: true set by default and their
Statuses do not contribute to the overall pipeline status. So, if a manual
action fails, the pipeline will eventually succeed.
Manual actions are considered to be write actions, so permissions for
protected branches are used when
user wants to trigger an action. In other words, in order to trigger a manual
action assigned to a branch that the pipeline is running for, user needs to
have ability to merge to this branch.
when:delayed
Introduced in GitLab 11.4.
Delayed job are for executing scripts after a certain period.
This is useful if you want to avoid jobs entering pending state immediately.
You can set the period with start_in key. The value of start_in key is an elapsed time in seconds, unless a unit is
provided. start_key must be less than or equal to one hour. Examples of valid values include:
10 seconds
30 minutes
1 hour
When there is a delayed job in a stage, the pipeline will not progress until the delayed job has finished.
This means this keyword can also be used for inserting delays between different stages.
The timer of a delayed job starts immediately after the previous stage has completed.
Similar to other types of jobs, a delayed job's timer will not start unless the previous stage passed.
The following example creates a job named timed rollout 10% that is executed 30 minutes after the previous stage has completed:
timed rollout 10%:
stage: deploy
script: echo 'Rolling out 10% ...'
when: delayed
start_in: 30 minutes
You can stop the active timer of a delayed job by clicking the Unschedule button.
This job will never be executed in the future unless you execute the job manually.
You can start a delayed job immediately by clicking the Play button.
GitLab runner will pick your job soon and start the job.
environment
Notes:
Introduced in GitLab 8.9.
You can read more about environments and find more examples in the
documentation about environments.
environment is used to define that a job deploys to a specific environment.
If environment is specified and no environment under that name exists, a new
one will be created automatically.
In its simplest form, the environment keyword can be defined like:
deploy to production:
stage: deploy
script: git push production HEAD:master
environment:
name: production
In the above example, the deploy to production job will be marked as doing a
deployment to the production environment.
environment:name
Notes:
Introduced in GitLab 8.11.
Before GitLab 8.11, the name of an environment could be defined as a string like
environment: production. The recommended way now is to define it under the
name keyword.
The name parameter can use any of the defined CI variables,
including predefined, secure variables and .gitlab-ci.yml variables.
You however cannot use variables defined under script.
The environment name can contain:
letters
digits
spaces
-
_
/
$
{
}
Common names are qa, staging, and production, but you can use whatever
name works with your workflow.
Instead of defining the name of the environment right after the environment
keyword, it is also possible to define it as a separate value. For that, use
the name keyword under environment:
deploy to production:
stage: deploy
script: git push production HEAD:master
environment:
name: production
environment:url
Notes:
Introduced in GitLab 8.11.
Before GitLab 8.11, the URL could be added only in GitLab's UI. The
recommended way now is to define it in .gitlab-ci.yml.
The url parameter can use any of the defined CI variables,
including predefined, secure variables and .gitlab-ci.yml variables.
You however cannot use variables defined under script.
This is an optional value that when set, it exposes buttons in various places
in GitLab which when clicked take you to the defined URL.
In the example below, if the job finishes successfully, it will create buttons
in the merge requests and in the environments/deployments pages which will point
to https://prod.example.com.
deploy to production:
stage: deploy
script: git push production HEAD:master
environment:
name: production
url: https://prod.example.com
environment:on_stop
Notes:
Introduced in GitLab 8.13.
Starting with GitLab 8.14, when you have an environment that has a stop action
defined, GitLab will automatically trigger a stop action when the associated
branch is deleted.
Closing (stoping) environments can be achieved with the on_stop keyword defined under
environment. It declares a different job that runs in order to close
the environment.
Read the environment:action section for an example.
environment:action
Introduced in GitLab 8.13.
The action keyword is to be used in conjunction with on_stop and is defined
in the job that is called to close the environment.
Take for instance:
review_app:
stage: deploy
script: make deploy-app
environment:
name: review
on_stop: stop_review_app
stop_review_app:
stage: deploy
script: make delete-app
when: manual
environment:
name: review
action: stop
In the above example we set up the review_app job to deploy to the review
environment, and we also defined a new stop_review_app job under on_stop.
Once the review_app job is successfully finished, it will trigger the
stop_review_app job based on what is defined under when. In this case we
set it up to manual so it will need a manual action via
GitLab's web interface in order to run.
The stop_review_app job is required to have the following keywords defined:
when - reference
environment:name
environment:action
stage should be the same as the review_app in order for the environment
to stop automatically when the branch is deleted
Dynamic environments
Notes:
Introduced in GitLab 8.12 and GitLab Runner 1.6.
The $CI_ENVIRONMENT_SLUG was introduced in GitLab 8.15.
The name and url parameters can use any of the defined CI variables,
including predefined, secure variables and .gitlab-ci.yml variables.
You however cannot use variables defined under script.
For example:
deploy as review app:
stage: deploy
script: make deploy
environment:
name: review/$CI_COMMIT_REF_NAME
url: https://$CI_ENVIRONMENT_SLUG.example.com/
The deploy as review app job will be marked as deployment to dynamically
create the review/$CI_COMMIT_REF_NAME environment, where $CI_COMMIT_REF_NAME
is an environment variable set by the Runner. The
$CI_ENVIRONMENT_SLUG variable is based on the environment name, but suitable
for inclusion in URLs. In this case, if the deploy as review app job was run
in a branch named pow, this environment would be accessible with an URL like
https://review-pow.example.com/.
This of course implies that the underlying server which hosts the application
is properly configured.
The common use case is to create dynamic environments for branches and use them
as Review Apps. You can see a simple example using Review Apps at
https://gitlab.com/gitlab-examples/review-apps-nginx/.
cache
Notes:
Introduced in GitLab Runner v0.7.0.
cache can be set globally and per-job.
From GitLab 9.0, caching is enabled and shared between pipelines and jobs
by default.
From GitLab 9.2, caches are restored before artifacts.
TIP: Learn more:
Read how caching works and find out some good practices in the
caching dependencies documentation.
cache is used to specify a list of files and directories which should be
cached between jobs. You can only use paths that are within the project
workspace.
If cache is defined outside the scope of jobs, it means it is set
globally and all jobs will use that definition.
cache:paths
Use the paths directive to choose which files or directories will be cached.
Wildcards can be used as well.
Cache all files in binaries that end in .apk and the .config file:
rspec:
script: test
cache:
paths:
- binaries/*.apk
- .config
Locally defined cache overrides globally defined options. The following rspec
job will cache only binaries/:
cache:
paths:
- my/files
rspec:
script: test
cache:
key: rspec
paths:
- binaries/
Note that since cache is shared between jobs, if you're using different
paths for different jobs, you should also set a different cache:key
otherwise cache content can be overwritten.
cache:key
Introduced in GitLab Runner v1.0.0.
Since the cache is shared between jobs, if you're using different
paths for different jobs, you should also set a different cache:key
otherwise cache content can be overwritten.
The key directive allows you to define the affinity of caching between jobs,
allowing to have a single cache for all jobs, cache per-job, cache per-branch
or any other way that fits your workflow. This way, you can fine tune caching,
allowing you to cache data between different jobs or even different branches.
The cache:key variable can use any of the
predefined variables, and the default key, if not
set, is just literal default which means everything is shared between each
pipelines and jobs by default, starting from GitLab 9.0.
NOTE: Note:
The cache:key variable cannot contain the / character, or the equivalent
URI-encoded %2F; a value made only of dots (., %2E) is also forbidden.
For example, to enable per-branch caching:
cache:
key: "$CI_COMMIT_REF_SLUG"
paths:
- binaries/
If you use Windows Batch to run your shell scripts you need to replace
$ with %:
cache:
key: "%CI_COMMIT_REF_SLUG%"
paths:
- binaries/
cache:untracked
Set untracked: true to cache all files that are untracked in your Git
repository:
rspec:
script: test
cache:
untracked: true
Cache all Git untracked files and files in binaries:
rspec:
script: test
cache:
untracked: true
paths:
- binaries/
cache:policy
Introduced in GitLab 9.4.
The default behaviour of a caching job is to download the files at the start of
execution, and to re-upload them at the end. This allows any changes made by the
job to be persisted for future runs, and is known as the pull-push cache
policy.
If you know the job doesn't alter the cached files, you can skip the upload step
by setting policy: pull in the job specification. Typically, this would be
twinned with an ordinary cache job at an earlier stage to ensure the cache
is updated from time to time:
stages:
- setup
- test
prepare:
stage: setup
cache:
key: gems
paths:
- vendor/bundle