GitLab Releaser

GitLab Releaser takes a JSON file with release details, including defaults and release specific overrides, and generates a JSON file for a particular release that can be passed to GitLab's release-cli application to create the release. Special handling is provided to pull some values from the project CHANGELOG and for environment variables.

GitLab Releaser file

GitLab Releaser can accept a GitLab Releaser file at .gitlab/gitlab-releaser.json which can contain default values applicable to all releases (defaults) and overrides for multiple specific releases denoted by release name (releases), for example:

{
  "defaults": {
    "assets": {
      "links": [
        {
          "name": "npm",
          "url": "https://www.npmjs.com/package/gitlab-releaser",
          "type": "package"
        }
      ]
    }
  },
  "releases": {
    "1.0.0": {
      "name": "v1.0.0 (2020-10-28)",
      "description": "Another release",
      "tag_name": "1.0.0",
      "milestones": ["1.0.0"]
    },
    "0.5.0": {
      "name": "v0.5.0 (2020-10-10)",
      "description": "Initial release",
      "tag_name": "0.5.0",
      "milestones": ["0.5.0"]
    }
  }
}

The defaults and each releases properties can contain any release properties, and the releases properties override any defaults for that release. The resulting file is saved as .gitlab/release.json.

The complete list of release properties is shown below (all are optional except where otherwise noted):

• name: Name of the release.
• description: Description of the release.
• tag_name: The tag to associate the release with.
• released_at: The time of release.
• ref: The commit ref to associate the release with.
• milestones: An array of milestone names to associate the release with (for example ['v1.0.0', 'v2.0.0']).
• assets: An object with the following properties:
  • links (required if assets is specified): An array of asset links with the following properties:
    • name (required): The displayed name of the link.
    • url (required): The URL of the link.
    • type: The type of link, one of:
      • package: A link to a package.
      • image: A link to an image.
      • archive: A link to an archive.
      • other: A link to another type of asset (default).
    • direct_asset_path: The path to the asset file.

A release name must be specified via the CLI to pull the appropriate release information. For example, --release 1.0.0 would result in the following .gitlab/release.json file. Note some property have slightly different names to match the release-cli file schema (for example tag-name, assets-link). The release property names in the preceding section have been found to be more intuitive, even though different.

{
  "name": "v1.0.0 (2020-10-28)",
  "description": "Another release",
  "tag-name": "1.0.0",
  "assets-link": [
    "{\"name\":\"npm\",\"url\":\"https://www.npmjs.com/package/gitlab-releaser\",\"type\":\"package\"}"
  ],
  "milestones": ["1.0.0"]
}

The full GitLab Releaser file JSON schema is available here. An example release-cli file with all properties is available here. Note that although release-cli accept a YAML file, GitLab Releaser generates the equivalent JSON file (YAML being a superset of JSON, so a JSON file is valid YAML).

Pulling data from changelog

The release name and description can optionally be pulled dynamically from the CHANGELOG. This is done if the value specified in the Release or GitLab Releaser file is "$$CHANGELOG," for example:

{
  "name": "$$CHANGELOG",
  "description": "$$CHANGELOG",
  "tag_name": "1.0.0"
}

The releaselog package is used to locate the CHANGELOG file, and by default looks in the current working directory and has logic to locate the CHANGELOG or determine which to use if multiple are found. A different CHANGELOG directory, or a specific file path, can alternatively be specified via the CLI. The releaselog package is also used to pull data from the CHANGELOG and has details on CHANGELOG formatting requirements. The data is retrieved by the tag specified via the CLI, if specified, otherwise the value of CI_COMMIT_TAG is used. Either a release name or the default value must be specified via the CLI if the release uses CHANGELOG data.

If either name or description specifies pulling data from the CHANGELOG and either the CHANGELOG can't be found or the release data can't be found in the CHANGELOG the job reports the error and fail.

Also, if the description retrieved from the CHANGELOG is empty the job reports the error and fail. This is almost always a CHANGELOG formatting or content issue, but there is a CLI option to allow an empty description if required (--allow-empty-changelog-desc).

Environment variables

GitLab Releaser tries to expand any environment variables in release properties that match either the format ${VARIABLE} or $VARIABLE. If the given variable has a value it is expanded, for example if the tag_name property is set to v${CI_COMMIT_TAG}, and the CI_COMMIT_TAG environment variable has the value 1.0.0, the resulting property is v1.0.0. Variables are expanded before CHANGELOG data is pulled, so variables in the CHANGELOG are not expanded.

If the variable doesn't have a value, the job reports the error and fails. There is a CLI option to allow empty variables if desired (--allow-empty-variables), and in this case the variables aren't expanded.

Usage

Command line usage

The gitlab-releaser command line interface is detailed below:

Usage: gitlab-releaser [options]

Options:
  -V, --version                     output the version number
  -r, --release <release>           the reference used to retrieve release data
                                    (default: "$CI_COMMIT_TAG")
  -c, --changelog <changelog>       the path to the CHANGELOG to check if the
                                    release pulls data from the CHANGELOG
                                    (default: ".")
  -a, --allow-empty-changelog-desc  allow an empty description when pulled from
                                    the CHANGELOG (default: false)
  -v, --allow-empty-variables       allow environment variables that are empty
                                    and are not expanded (default: false)
  -h, --help                        display help for command

GitLab CI usage

The following is an example .gitlab-ci.yml file illustrating preparing and creating a release on every tag pipeline.

prepare_release:
  image: node:lts-alpine
  needs: []
  before_script:
    - npm install -g gitlab-releaser
  script:
    - gitlab-releaser
  rules:
    - if: $CI_COMMIT_TAG
  artifacts:
    paths:
      - '.gitlab/release.json'

create_release:
  image: registry.gitlab.com/gitlab-org/release-cli:latest
  needs:
    - prepare_release
  script:
    - release-cli create-from-file -file .gitlab/release.json
  rules:
    - if: $CI_COMMIT_TAG

The process is split into two jobs to avoid having to create a container image that can run this Node.js application to prepare the release and has GitLab's release-cli application to create the release.

The prepare_release job uses a Node.js container image and installs and runs gitlab-releaser to generate the JSON file for the release, saved as .gitlab/release.json. The create_release job then uses GitLab's release-cli container image (registry.gitlab.com/gitlab-org/release-cli) to run release-cli, pulling values from the file .gitlab/release.json.

GitLab CI usage without release files

The example below shows how to setup a GitLab prepare_release job template with a default release configuration defined in CI job (in the environment variable $RELEASE, which contains the minified configuration from a gitlab-releaser.json file), which is only used if the project doesn't have it's own gitlab-releaser.json file.

# gitlab-releaser.gitlab-ci.yml
prepare_release:
  image: node:lts-alpine
  needs: []
  variables:
    # Set default to create a release that pulls the name and description from
    # the project CHANGELOG. Use expand false to not try to expand the $.
    RELEASE:
      value: '{"defaults":{"name":"$$CHANGELOG","description":"$$CHANGELOG"}}'
      expand: false

  before_script:
    - npm install -g gitlab-releaser
    # If a GitLab Releaser file does not exists, create a file with the release from variable.
    - |
      if [ ! -f .gitlab/gitlab-releaser.json ]; then
        mkdir -p .gitlab && echo $RELEASE > .gitlab/gitlab-releaser.json
      fi
  script:
    - gitlab-releaser
  rules:
    - if: $CI_COMMIT_TAG
  artifacts:
    paths:
      - '.gitlab/release.json'

The default release configuration can then be overridden by including this template, and simply overriding the $RELEASE variable with the minified configuration from a gitlab-releaser.json file.

include:
  # Include from the appropriate location
  - local: 'gitlab-releaser.gitlab-ci.yml'

prepare_release:
  variables:
    RELEASE:
      value: '{"defaults":{"name":"${CI_COMMIT_TAG}","description":"$$CHANGELOG"}}'
      expand: false