Is it possible in gitlab-ci build another branch to another directory?

Question

I want to use one gitlab-runner to make two similar, but not exact same builds.

In the git repository, I have several branches: prod, test, dev. Is it possible to use only one runner to build on different paths?

For example:

• /home/gitlab-runner/builds/860ee11a/0/projectname - prod
• /home/gitlab-runner/builds/860ee11a/1/projectname - test
• /home/gitlab-runner/builds/860ee11a/2/projectname - dev

If so, how do you do that?

Answer 1

Yes, you can do that.

You can use this logic:

image: <image>       # choose your image (ryby, python, node, php etc)

# add cache for speeding up builds
cache:
  paths: 
    - <cache-folder>/ # the name will need to be set according to your project

before_script:
  - <your command>    # here you set the commands you want to run for every commit 
  - <your command>

# add a job called 'build' -> to run your builds
build:
  stage: build        # this will define the stage
  script:
    - <your scripts>  # choose the script you want to run first
  only:
    - build           # the 'build' job will affect only 'build' branch

# add a job called 'test' -> to run your tests
test:
  stage: test         # this will define the stage
  script:
    - <your scripts>  # choose the script similar to the deployment
  except:
    - master          # the 'test' job will affect all branches expect 'master'

# the 'deploy' job will deploy and build your project
deploy:
  stage: deploy
  script:
    - <your scripts>  # your deployment script
  artifacts:
    paths:
      - <folder>      # generate files resulting from your builds for you to download 
  only:
    - master          # this job will affect only the 'master' branch

You can also use when to run a job when another succeeds or fails.

Examples:

• Test + Build for GitLab Pages website
• Multiple stages for iOS app
• PHP project with a lot of nice stuff

Docs:

• GitLab CI (jobs, stages, artifacts, only & except, etc)

Hope to have helped!

Answer 2

Yes this is the default behavior. Whenever you push to the repo (regardless of the branch), an active runner will go ahead and run your build. Log and artifacts are stored independently.

In your .gitlab-ci.yml you can take different actions based on the branch or tag name. See http://doc.gitlab.com/ce/ci/yaml/README.html for more info and look for the only and except key words.

Finally you can create triggers that use the API. See http://doc.gitlab.com/ce/ci/triggers/README.html