GitLab Generic Packages Repository
- Introduced in GitLab 13.5.
- It’s deployed behind a feature flag, enabled by default.
- It’s enabled on GitLab.com.
- It’s able to be enabled or disabled per-project.
- It’s recommended for production use.
- For GitLab self-managed instances, GitLab administrators can opt to disable it.
Publish generic files, like release binaries, in your project’s Package Registry. Then, install the packages whenever you need to use them as a dependency.
Authenticate to the Package Registry
To authenticate to the Package Registry, you need either a personal access token, CI/CD job token, or deploy token.
In addition to the standard API authentication mechanisms, the generic package
API allows authentication with HTTP Basic authentication for use with tools that
do not support the other available mechanisms. The user-id
is not checked and
may be any value, and the password
must be either a personal access token,
a CI/CD job token, or a deploy token.
Publish a package file
When you publish a package file, if the package does not exist, it is created.
If a package with the same name, version, and filename already exists, it is also created. It does not overwrite the existing package.
Prerequisites:
- You need to authenticate with the API. If authenticating with a deploy token, it must be configured with the
write_package_registry
scope.
PUT /projects/:id/packages/generic/:package_name/:package_version/:file_name?status=:status
Attribute | Type | Required | Description |
---|---|---|---|
id
| integer/string | yes | The ID or URL-encoded path of the project. |
package_name
| string | yes | The package name. It can contain only lowercase letters (a-z ), uppercase letter (A-Z ), numbers (0-9 ), dots (. ), hyphens (- ), or underscores (_ ).
|
package_version
| string | yes | The package version. The following regex validates this: \A(\.?[\w\+-]+\.?)+\z . You can test your version strings on Rubular.
|
file_name
| string | yes | The filename. It can contain only lowercase letters (a-z ), uppercase letter (A-Z ), numbers (0-9 ), dots (. ), hyphens (- ), or underscores (_ ).
|
status
| string | no | The package status. It can be default (default) or hidden . Hidden packages do not appear in the UI or package API list endpoints.
|
Provide the file context in the request body.
Example request using a personal access token:
curl --header "PRIVATE-TOKEN: <your_access_token>" \
--upload-file path/to/file.txt \
"https://gitlab.example.com/api/v4/projects/24/packages/generic/my_package/0.0.1/file.txt?status=hidden"
Example response:
{
"message":"201 Created"
}
Download package file
Download a package file.
If multiple packages have the same name, version, and filename, then the most recent one is retrieved.
Prerequisites:
- You need to authenticate with the API. If authenticating with a deploy token, it must be configured with the
read_package_registry
and/orwrite_package_registry
scope.
GET /projects/:id/packages/generic/:package_name/:package_version/:file_name
Attribute | Type | Required | Description |
---|---|---|---|
id
| integer/string | yes | The ID or URL-encoded path of the project. |
package_name
| string | yes | The package name. |
package_version
| string | yes | The package version. |
file_name
| string | yes | The filename. |
The file context is served in the response body. The response content type is application/octet-stream
.
Example request that uses a personal access token:
curl --header "PRIVATE-TOKEN: <your_access_token>" \
"https://gitlab.example.com/api/v4/projects/24/packages/generic/my_package/0.0.1/file.txt"
Example request that uses HTTP Basic authentication:
curl --user "user:<your_access_token>" \
https://gitlab.example.com/api/v4/projects/24/packages/generic/my_package/0.0.1/file.txt
Publish a generic package by using CI/CD
To work with generic packages in GitLab CI/CD, you can use
CI_JOB_TOKEN
in place of the personal access token in your commands.
For example:
image: curlimages/curl:latest
stages:
- upload
- download
upload:
stage: upload
script:
- 'curl --header "JOB-TOKEN: $CI_JOB_TOKEN" --upload-file path/to/file.txt "${CI_API_V4_URL}/projects/${CI_PROJECT_ID}/packages/generic/my_package/0.0.1/file.txt"'
download:
stage: download
script:
- 'wget --header="JOB-TOKEN: $CI_JOB_TOKEN" ${CI_API_V4_URL}/projects/${CI_PROJECT_ID}/packages/generic/my_package/0.0.1/file.txt'
Enable or disable generic packages in the Package Registry
Support for generic packages is under development but ready for production use. It is deployed behind a feature flag that is enabled by default. GitLab administrators with access to the GitLab Rails console can opt to disable it.
To enable it:
# For the instance
Feature.enable(:generic_packages)
# For a single project
Feature.enable(:generic_packages, Project.find(<project id>))
To disable it:
# For the instance
Feature.disable(:generic_packages)
# For a single project
Feature.disable(:generic_packages, Project.find(<project id>))
Generic package sample project
The Write CI-CD Variables in Pipeline project contains a working example you can use to create, upload, and download generic packages in GitLab CI/CD.
It also demonstrates how to manage a semantic version for the generic package: storing it in a CI/CD variable, retrieving it, incrementing it, and writing it back to the CI/CD variable when tests for the download work correctly.