Reusable Configuration Sections Using the "extends" Keyword

Consice, Reusable and Refactored Definitions

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Sometimes you may find yourself repeating the same configuration in multiple jobs. This is an example:

stages:
  - test

test1:
  stage: test
  image: alpine:latest
  before_script:
    - echo "Setting up the environment..."
  script:
    - echo "Running tests for test1..."
  after_script:
    - echo "Cleaning up..."

test2:
  stage: test
  image: alpine:latest
  before_script:
    - echo "Setting up the environment..."
  script:
    - echo "Running tests for test2..."
  after_script:
    - echo "Cleaning up..."

ℹ️ The keyword before_script is used to define a script that runs before each job in the pipeline. The keyword after_script is used to define a script that runs after each job in the pipeline.

As you can see, test1 and test2 are almost identical since they share the same configuration. Using the extends keyword, you can define a base configuration that can be reused across multiple jobs. Here is how we can refactor the pipeline:

stages:
  - test

.base_test:
  stage: test
  image: alpine:latest
  before_script:
    - echo "Setting up the environment..."
  after_script:
    - echo "Cleaning up..."

test1:
  extends: .base_test  
  script:
    - echo "Running tests for test1..."

test2:
  extends: .base_test
  script:
    - echo "Running tests for test2..."

We can also combine the extends keyword with the include keyword. This is an example:

Step 1: Create the file base_test.yml:

cat <$HOME/todo/app/.includes/base_test.yml
# base_test.yml
.base_test:
  stage: test
  image: alpine:latest
  before_script:
    - echo "Setting up the environment..."
  after_script:
    - echo "Cleaning up..."
EOF

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