gitlab-org--gitlab-foss/doc/api/lint.md

stage	group	info
Verify	Continuous Integration	To determine the technical writer assigned to the Stage/Group associated with this page, see https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/engineering/ux/technical-writing/#designated-technical-writers

CI Lint API

Validate the CI YAML configuration

Introduced in GitLab 8.12.

Checks if CI/CD YAML configuration is valid. This endpoint validates basic CI/CD configuration syntax. It doesn't have any namespace specific context.

POST /ci/lint

Attribute	Type	Required	Description
content	string	yes	The CI/CD configuration content.
include_merged_yaml	boolean	no	If the expanded CI/CD configuration should be included in the response.

curl --header "Content-Type: application/json" "https://gitlab.example.com/api/v4/ci/lint" --data '{"content": "{ \"image\": \"ruby:2.6\", \"services\": [\"postgres\"], \"before_script\": [\"bundle install\", \"bundle exec rake db:create\"], \"variables\": {\"DB_NAME\": \"postgres\"}, \"types\": [\"test\", \"deploy\", \"notify\"], \"rspec\": { \"script\": \"rake spec\", \"tags\": [\"ruby\", \"postgres\"], \"only\": [\"branches\"]}}"}'

Be sure to paste the exact contents of your GitLab CI/CD YAML configuration because YAML is very sensitive about indentation and spacing.

Example responses:

• Valid content:

  {
    "status": "valid",
    "errors": []
  }
  

• Invalid content:

  {
    "status": "invalid",
    "errors": [
      "variables config should be a hash of key value pairs"
    ]
  }
  

• Without the content attribute:

  {
    "error": "content is missing"
  }
  

YAML expansion

Introduced in GitLab 13.5.

The CI lint returns an expanded version of the configuration. The expansion does not work for CI configuration added with include: local, or with extends:.

Example contents of a .gitlab-ci.yml passed to the CI Lint API with include_merged_yaml set as true:

include:
  remote: 'https://example.com/remote.yaml'

test:
  stage: test
  script:
    - echo 1

Example contents of https://example.com/remote.yaml:

another_test:
  stage: test
  script:
    - echo 2

Example response:

{
  "status": "valid",
  "errors": [],
  "merged_config": "---\n:another_test:\n  :stage: test\n  :script: echo 2\n:test:\n  :stage: test\n  :script: echo 1\n"
}

Validate a project's CI configuration

Introduced in GitLab 13.5.

Checks if a project's latest (HEAD of the project's default branch) .gitlab-ci.yml configuration is valid. This endpoint uses all namespace specific data available, including variables, local includes, and so on.

GET /projects/:id/ci/lint

Attribute	Type	Required	Description
dry_run	boolean	no	Run pipeline creation simulation, or only do static check.

Example request:

curl "https://gitlab.example.com/api/v4/projects/:id/ci/lint"

Example responses:

• Valid configuration:

{
  "valid": true,
  "merged_yaml": "---\n:test_job:\n  :script: echo 1\n",
  "errors": [],
  "warnings": []
}

• Invalid configuration:

{
  "valid": false,
  "merged_yaml": "---\n:test_job:\n  :script: echo 1\n",
  "errors": [
    "jobs config should contain at least one visible job"
  ],
  "warnings": []
}

Use jq to create and process YAML & JSON payloads

To POST a YAML configuration to the CI Lint endpoint, it must be properly escaped and JSON encoded. You can use jq and curl to escape and upload YAML to the GitLab API.

Escape YAML for JSON encoding

To escape quotes and encode your YAML in a format suitable for embedding within a JSON payload, you can use jq. For example, create a file named example-gitlab-ci.yml:

.api_test:
  rules:
    - if: '$CI_PIPELINE_SOURCE=="merge_request_event"'
      changes:
        - src/api/*
deploy:
  extends:
    - .api_test
  rules:
    - when: manual
      allow_failure: true
  script:
    - echo "hello world"

Next, use jq to escape and encode the YAML file into JSON:

jq --raw-input --slurp < example-gitlab-ci.yml

To escape and encode an input YAML file (example-gitlab-ci.yml), and POST it to the GitLab API using curl and jq in a one-line command:

jq --null-input --arg yaml "$(<example-gitlab-ci.yml)" '.content=$yaml' \
| curl 'https://gitlab.com/api/v4/ci/lint?include_merged_yaml=true' \
--header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
--data @-

Parse a CI Lint response

To reformat the CI Lint response, you can use jq. You can pipe the CI Lint response to jq, or store the API response as a text file and provide it as an argument:

jq --raw-output '.merged_yaml | fromjson' <your_input_here>

Example input:

{"status":"valid","errors":[],"merged_yaml":"---\n:.api_test:\n  :rules:\n  - :if: $CI_PIPELINE_SOURCE==\"merge_request_event\"\n    :changes:\n    - src/api/*\n:deploy:\n  :rules:\n  - :when: manual\n    :allow_failure: true\n  :extends:\n  - \".api_test\"\n  :script:\n  - echo \"hello world\"\n"}

Becomes:

:.api_test:
  :rules:
  - :if: $CI_PIPELINE_SOURCE=="merge_request_event"
    :changes:
    - src/api/*
:deploy:
  :rules:
  - :when: manual
    :allow_failure: true
  :extends:
  - ".api_test"
  :script:
  - echo "hello world"

With a one-line command, you can:

1. Escape the YAML
2. Encode it in JSON
3. POST it to the API with curl
4. Format the response

jq --null-input --arg yaml "$(<example-gitlab-ci.yml)" '.content=$yaml' \
| curl 'https://gitlab.com/api/v4/ci/lint?include_merged_yaml=true' \
--header 'Content-Type: application/json' --data @- \
| jq --raw-output '.merged_yaml | fromjson'