I have many different GitLab CI jobs in my repository and dependent on variables that are set by an user in a config file I want to execute different sequences of jobs. My approach is to create a scheduler job that analyzes the config file and executes the jobs accordingly. However, I cannot figure out how to execute another job from within a job.
Any help is appreciated!
This would be a good use case for dynamic child pipelines. This is pretty much the only way to customize a pipeline based on the outcome of another job.
From the docs:
generate-config:
stage: build
script: generate-ci-config > generated-config.yml
artifacts:
paths:
- generated-config.yml
child-pipeline:
stage: test
trigger:
include:
- artifact: generated-config.yml
job: generate-config
In your case, the script generate-ci-config would be the analysis of your config files and creates a job configuration conditionally based on the config contents.
Related
I have a CICD configuration that looks something like this:
.rule_template: &rule_configuration
rules:
- changes:
- file/dev/script1.txt
variables:
DESTINATION_HOST: somehost1
RUNNER_TAG: somerunner1
- changes:
- file/test/script1.txt
variables:
DESTINATION_HOST: somehost2
RUNNER_TAG: somerunner2
default:
tags:
- scripts
stages:
- lint
deploy scripts 1/6:
<<: *rule_configuration
tags:
- ${RUNNER_TAG}
stage: lint
script: |
echo "Add linting here!"
....
In short, which runner to choose depends on which file was changed, hence the runner tag has to be conditionally decided. However, these jobs never execute and the value of never gets assigned as i always get:
This job is stuck because you don't have any active runners online or available with any of these tags assigned to them: ${RUNNER_TAG}
Any idea, what is it this way and what can I do to resolve this?
gitlab-runner --version
Version: 14.7.0
Git revision: 98daeee0
Git branch: 14-7-stable
GO version: go1.17.5
Built: 2022-01-19T17:11:48+0000
OS/Arch: linux/amd64
Tags map jobs to runners. I tag my runners with the type of executor they use, e.g. - shell, docker.
Based on the error message, you do not have any runners with the tag ${RUNNER_TAG}, which means that it is not resolving the variable the way you want it to.
Instead of combining rules like this, make separate jobs for each, and a rule for each to say when to trigger it.
I have faced this issue, and similar issues many times while trying to do some dynamic pipelines for a multi-client environment.
The config you have above should work for your purposes to the best of my knowledge, but since it is not there is another way to accomplish this with trigger jobs.
Create a trigger job for each possible runner tag. You can use extends to reduce the total code required for this.
gitlab-ci.yml
stages:
- trigger
- lint
.trigger:
stage: trigger
trigger:
include:
- local: ./lint-job.yml
strategy: depend
trigger-lint-script1:
extends:
- .trigger
variables:
RUNNER_TAG: somerunner1
rules:
- changes:
- file/dev/script1.txt
trigger-lint-script2:
extends:
- .trigger
variables:
RUNNER_TAG: somerunner2
rules:
- changes:
- file/dev/script2.txt
Create a trigger job with associated rules for each possible tag. This way you can change more than one of the specified files in a single commit with no issues. Define the triggered job in lint-job.yml
lint-job.yml
deploy scripts 1/6:
tags: [$RUNNER_TAG]
stage: lint
script: |
echo "Add linting here!"
There are other ways to accomplish this, but this method is by far the simplest and cleanest for this particular use.
I'm creating a template for all the deploy jobs, and I need to be able to use needs keyword with different values for each deploy job, but GitLab CI, as far as I know, does not support using variable in needs keyword. Is there any workaround?
This is what I need to do:
# Deploy template
.deploy:
stage: deploy
only:
- develop
tags:
- deploy
needsL ["build:$PROJECT_NAME"]
# Deploy jobs
deploy:package1:
extends: .deploy
variables:
PROJECT_NAME: 'package1'
#needs: ['build:package1']
deploy:package2:
extends: .deploy
variables:
PROJECT_NAME: 'package2'
#needs: ['build:package2']
You can't do this. needs: will not support variables.
However, if the template you're making does not contain the job it depends on, the best approach is probably to not use needs: at all, otherwise you greatly increase the likelihood that including your template will cause an invalid yaml file.
So, your options would be either to (1) include the jobs you depend on in the same template, then designate needs: explicitly or (2) Rely on users to provide the needs: key in the deploy job if they want.
For example, a user can do this:
include:
- "your template"
# job originates in the project configuration
my_project_jobs:
script: "..."
your_deploy_template_job:
needs: ["my_project_job"] # add the key to the included template job
Or if you provide both jobs in your pipeline configuration, you can use some rules: to keep the jobs from running, and let users enable them and override their script configurations to implement builds.
# your template yaml
your_template_build_job:package1
rules:
- if: '$PACKAGE1_ENABLED'
when: on_success
- when: never
your_template_deploy_job:package1
rules:
- if: '$PACKAGE1_ENABLED'
needs: [your_template_build_job:package1]
# ...
Then a user might just do this:
# user project yaml
include:
- "your template"
variables:
PACKAGE1_ENABLED: true
your_template_build_job:package1
script: "my project build script"
When the user doesn't explicitly enable a job, neither the build nor deploy job will be in the pipeline configuration. However, they only need to enable the build job (by variable) and the needs: configuration for the deploy job will already be in place.
Neither of these approaches are particularly perfect for very flexible use of templates, unfortunately. But there may be another option...
Workaround: Dynamic child pipelines
As a possible workaround, users could use dynamic child pipelines to generate an entire pipeline configuration with correct needs: based on a minimal configuration. Almost anything is possible with dynamic child pipelines because you can generate the YAML programmatically on-the-fly, though, it may be more trouble than it's worth.
I have a dependency problem. My pipeline looks like it gets the dependencies required for jobs first, and finally runs a stage cleanup that cleans them all. The problem is that I have one stage with manual launch which also needs these dependencies but they are cleared.
Question can I somehow run a stage which has dependencies by running a manual stage? is there any other way i can solve this problem?
The normal behaviour of GitLab-CI is to clone the git repository at each job because the jobs can be run on different runners and thus need to be independent.
The automatic clone can be disabled by adding:
job-with-no-git-clone:
variables:
GIT_STRATEGY: none
If you need to use in a job some files/directories created in a previous stage, you must add them as GitLab artifacts
stages:
- one
- two
job-with-git-clone:
stage: one
script:
# this script creates something in the folder data
# (which means $CI_PROJECT_DIR/data)
do_something()
artifacts:
paths:
- data/
job2-with-git-clone:
stage: two
script:
# here you can use the files created in data
job2-with-no-git-clone:
stage: two
variables:
GIT_STRATEGY: none
script:
# here you can use the files created in data
I'm looking for a way to run parallels jobs in different runners. I have several powerful runners set up for GitLab CI. In general, it's ok to run jobs on the same runner because they're executed in Docker container.
However, now I have a Pipeline that jobs are executed in parallel and each job consumes lots of CPU and Mem.(it's by design, not an issue). If it's unlucky that GitLab CI schedules those jobs to the same runner, job fails.
And, I want this limitation applies to this project ONLY, as my runners have 30+ CPU and 120GB+ Memory.
Thanks in advance.
It is possible, if you have set up say two runners (either specific, shared or group runners) with tags.
Say, runner1 has tags runner1-ci, my-runner1
Similarly, runner2 has tags runner2-ci, my-runner2
Now, in your .gitlab-ci.yml file, you can use the tags like below, so a job will pick up that particular runner and execute the job.
image: maven:latest
stages:
- build
- test
- deploy
install_dependencies:
stage: build
tags:
- runner1-ci
script:
- pwd
- echo "Build"
test:
stage: test
tags:
- runner2-ci
script:
- echo "Testing"
deploy:
stage: deploy
tags:
- runner1-ci
script:
- echo "Deploy to nexus"
Note: This is just an example .gitlab-ci.yml to demonstrate the use of tags in pipeline.
How can I create a CI job that spans more than one stage, to improve parallelism?
As in the following diagram:
The idea is that slow_build should start as early as build, but test doesn't depend on it, so test should be able to start as soon as build is done.
(Note that this is a simplification: each stage has multiple processes running in parallel, otherwise I could just bundle build and test together.)
This is now possible as of Gitlab version 12.2. By adding the keyword needs to jobs that depend on other jobs, stages can now run concurrently. The full documentation for the needs keyword is here, but an example from the docs follows: https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/ci/yaml/#needs
linux:build:
stage: build
mac:build:
stage: build
lint:
stage: test
needs: []
linux:rspec:
stage: test
needs: ["linux:build"]
linux:rubocop:
stage: test
needs: ["linux:build"]
mac:rspec:
stage: test
needs: ["mac:build"]
mac:rubocop:
stage: test
needs: ["mac:build"]
production:
stage: deploy
Since the lint job doesn't need anything, it runs instantly, as does linux:build and mac:build. However, if linux:build finishes before mac:build then both linux:rspec and linux:rubocop can start, even before mac:build and the build stage complete.
As usual, without the needs keyword, the production job requires all previous jobs to complete before it starts.
When using needs in your pipelines, you can also view a Directed Acyclic Graph of your jobs in the pipeline view. More on that can be found here: https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/ci/directed_acyclic_graph/index.html