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Big Picture

GitLab CI Integration

GitLab CI pipelines can publish releases into Big Picture automatically. This integration enables artifact registration, release creation, and multi-platform builds using GitLab CI/CD pipelines.

Overview

Section titled “Overview”

GitLab CI integration uses .gitlab-ci.yml pipeline files to automate Big Picture release publishing. Pipelines can trigger on Git tags, push events, or manual runs. The integration supports external artifact references and managed artifact storage.

Prerequisites

Section titled “Prerequisites”
  1. Service account — Create a Big Picture service account with ci:write and artifacts:write scopes
  2. CI/CD variables — Store API token as BP_API_TOKEN variable (masked, protected)
  3. Configuration — Set BP_BASE_URL and BP_PRODUCT_ID as CI/CD variables

Basic Pipeline Pattern

Section titled “Basic Pipeline Pattern”

GitLab CI pipelines follow this pattern:

  1. Build stage — Build installers or packages
  2. Register stage — Register artifacts with Big Picture
  3. Publish stage — Create release referencing artifacts

Common Use Cases

Section titled “Common Use Cases”

Tag-Based Releases

Section titled “Tag-Based Releases”

Pipelines trigger on Git tags and publish releases automatically:

only:
  - tags

Multi-Platform Releases

Section titled “Multi-Platform Releases”

Pipelines build artifacts for Windows, macOS, and Linux in parallel jobs, then create a single release.

Artifact Passing

Section titled “Artifact Passing”

Pipelines use GitLab artifacts and dotenv reports to pass artifact metadata between jobs.

Integration Points

Section titled “Integration Points”
  • Artifact registration — Register artifacts via /v1/artifacts endpoint
  • Managed uploads — Upload artifacts via /v1/artifacts/uploads endpoints
  • Release creation — Create releases via /v1/releases endpoint
  • Error handling — Handle API errors with set -e and exit code checks

Configuration

Section titled “Configuration”

Store Big Picture credentials as GitLab CI/CD variables:

  • BP_API_TOKEN — Service account API token (masked, protected)
  • BP_BASE_URL — Big Picture API base URL (optional)
  • BP_PRODUCT_ID — Product ID (optional)

Next Steps

Section titled “Next Steps”

Detailed step-by-step guides for GitLab CI integration are planned. These guides will include:

  • Complete pipeline examples for single and multi-platform releases
  • Managed artifact upload pipelines
  • Artifact passing between jobs
  • Error handling patterns

For now, see the CI/CD Integration overview for general integration patterns.

Section titled “Related Documentation”