doc/source/user/jobs.rst

:title: Job Content

Job Content
===========

Zuul jobs are implemented as Ansible playbooks.  Zuul prepares the
repositories used for a job, installs any required Ansible roles, and
then executes the job's playbooks.  Any setup or artifact collection
required is the responsibility of the job itself.  While this flexible
arrangement allows for almost any kind of job to be run by Zuul,
batteries are included.  Zuul has a standard library of jobs upon
which to build.

Working Directory
-----------------

Before starting each job, the Zuul executor creates a directory to
hold all of the content related to the job.  This includes some
directories which are used by Zuul to configure and run Ansible and
may not be accessible, as well as a directory tree, under ``work/``,
that is readable and writable by the job.  The hierarchy is:

**work/**
  The working directory of the job.

**work/src/**
  Contains the prepared git repositories for the job.

**work/logs/**
  Where the Ansible log for the job is written; your job
  may place other logs here as well.

Git Repositories
----------------

The git repositories in ``work/src`` contain the repositories for all
of the projects specified in the ``required-projects`` section of the
job, plus the project associated with the queue item if it isn't
already in that list.  In the case of a proposed change, that change
and all of the changes ahead of it in the pipeline queue will already
be merged into their respective repositories and target branches.  The
change's project will have the change's branch checked out, as will
all of the other projects, if that branch exists (otherwise, a
fallback or default branch will be used).  If your job needs to
operate on multiple branches, simply checkout the appropriate branches
of these git repos to ensure that the job results reflect the proposed
future state that Zuul is testing, and all dependencies are present.
Do not use any git remotes; the local repositories are guaranteed to
be up to date.

The repositories will be placed on the filesystem in directories
corresponding with the canonical hostname of their source connection.
For example::

  work/src/git.example.com/project1
  work/src/github.com/project2

Is the layout that would be present for a job which included project1
from the connection associated to git.example.com and project2 from
GitHub.  This helps avoid collisions between projects with the same
name, and some language environments, such as Go, expect repositories
in this format.

Note that these git repositories are located on the executor; in order
to be useful to most kinds of jobs, they will need to be present on
the test nodes.  The ``base`` job in the standard library contains a
pre-playbook which copies the repositories to all of the job's nodes.
It is recommended to always inherit from this base job to ensure that
behavior.

.. TODO: link to base job documentation and/or document src (and logs?) directory

Variables
---------

There are several sources of variables which are available to Ansible:
variables defined in jobs, secrets, and site-wide variables.  The
order of precedence is:

* Site-wide variables

* Secrets

* Job variables

* Parent job results

Meaning that a site-wide variable with the same name as any other will
override its value, and similarly, secrets override job variables of
the same name which override data returned from parent jobs.  Each of
the sources is described below.


Job Variables
~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Any variables specified in the job definition (using the
:attr:`job.vars` attribute) are available as Ansible host variables.
They are added to the ``vars`` section of the inventory file under the
``all`` hosts group, so they are available to all hosts.  Simply refer
to them by the name specified in the job's ``vars`` section.

Secrets
~~~~~~~

:ref:`Secrets <secret>` also appear as variables available to Ansible.
Unlike job variables, these are not added to the inventory file (so
that the inventory file may be kept for debugging purposes without
revealing secrets).  But they are still available to Ansible as normal
variables.  Because secrets are groups of variables, they will appear
as a dictionary structure in templates, with the dictionary itself
being the name of the secret, and its members the individual items in
the secret.  For example, a secret defined as:

.. code-block:: yaml

  - secret:
      name: credentials
      data:
        username: foo
        password: bar

Might be used in a template as::

 {{ credentials.username }} {{ credentials.password }}

Secrets are only available to playbooks associated with the job
definition which uses the secret; they are not available to playbooks
associated with child jobs or job variants.

Zuul Variables
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Zuul supplies not only the variables specified by the job definition
to Ansible, but also some variables from Zuul itself.

When a pipeline is triggered by an action, it enqueues items which may
vary based on the pipeline's configuration.  For example, when a new
change is created, that change may be enqueued into the pipeline,
while a tag may be enqueued into the pipeline when it is pushed.

Information about these items is available to jobs.  All of the items
enqueued in a pipeline are git references, and therefore share some
attributes in common.  But other attributes may vary based on the type
of item.

.. var:: zuul

   All items provide the following information as Ansible variables
   under the ``zuul`` key:

   .. var:: build

      The UUID of the build.  A build is a single execution of a job.
      When an item is enqueued into a pipeline, this usually results
      in one build of each job configured for that item's project.
      However, items may be re-enqueued in which case another build
      may run.  In dependent pipelines, the same job may run multiple
      times for the same item as circumstances change ahead in the
      queue.  Each time a job is run, for whatever reason, it is
      acompanied with a new unique id.

   .. var:: buildset

      The build set UUID.  When Zuul runs jobs for an item, the
      collection of those jobs is known as a buildset.  If the
      configuration of items ahead in a dependent pipeline changes,
      Zuul creates a new buildset and restarts all of the jobs.

   .. var:: ref

      The git ref of the item.  This will be the full path (e.g.,
      `refs/heads/master` or `refs/changes/...`).

   .. var:: pipeline

      The name of the pipeline in which the job is being run.

   .. var:: job

      The name of the job being run.

   .. var:: voting

      A boolean indicating whether the job is voting.

   .. var:: project

      The item's project.  This is a data structure with the following
      fields:

      .. var:: name

         The name of the project, excluding hostname.  E.g., `org/project`.

      .. var:: short_name

         The name of the project, excluding directories or
         organizations.  E.g., `project`.

      .. var:: canonical_hostname

         The canonical hostname where the project lives.  E.g.,
         `git.example.com`.

      .. var:: canonical_name

         The full canonical name of the project including hostname.
         E.g., `git.example.com/org/project`.

      .. var:: src_dir

         The path to the source code relative to the work dir.  E.g.,
         `src/git.example.com/org/project`.

   .. var:: projects
      :type: list

      A list of all projects prepared by Zuul for the item.  It
      includes, at least, the item's own project.  It also includes
      the projects of any items this item depends on, as well as the
      projects that appear in :attr:`job.required-projects`.

      This is a list of dictionaries, with each element consisting of:

      .. var:: name

         The name of the project, excluding hostname.  E.g., `org/project`.

      .. var:: short_name

         The name of the project, excluding directories or
         organizations.  E.g., `project`.

      .. var:: canonical_hostname

         The canonical hostname where the project lives.  E.g.,
         `git.example.com`.

      .. var:: canonical_name

         The full canonical name of the project including hostname.
         E.g., `git.example.com/org/project`.

      .. var:: src_dir

         The path to the source code, relative to the work dir.  E.g.,
         `src/git.example.com/org/project`.

      .. var:: required

         A boolean indicating whether this project appears in the
         :attr:`job.required-projects` list for this job.

   .. var:: _projects
      :type: dict

      The same as ``projects`` but a dictionary indexed by the
      ``name`` value of each entry.  ``projects`` will be converted to
      this.

   .. var:: tenant

      The name of the current Zuul tenant.

   .. var:: timeout

      The job timeout, in seconds.

   .. var:: jobtags

      A list of tags associated with the job.  Not to be confused with
      git tags, these are simply free-form text fields that can be
      used by the job for reporting or classification purposes.

   .. var:: items
      :type: list

      A list of dictionaries, each representing an item being tested
      with this change with the format:

      .. var:: project

         The item's project.  This is a data structure with the
         following fields:

         .. var:: name

            The name of the project, excluding hostname.  E.g.,
            `org/project`.

         .. var:: short_name

            The name of the project, excluding directories or
            organizations.  E.g., `project`.

         .. var:: canonical_hostname

            The canonical hostname where the project lives.  E.g.,
            `git.example.com`.

         .. var:: canonical_name

            The full canonical name of the project including hostname.
            E.g., `git.example.com/org/project`.

         .. var:: src_dir

            The path to the source code on the remote host, relative
            to the home dir of the remote user.
            E.g., `src/git.example.com/org/project`.

      .. var:: branch

         The target branch of the change (without the `refs/heads/` prefix).

      .. var:: change

         The identifier for the change.

      .. var:: change_url

         The URL to the source location of the given change.
         E.g., `https://review.example.org/#/c/123456/` or
         `https://github.com/example/example/pull/1234`.

      .. var:: patchset

         The patchset identifier for the change.  If a change is
         revised, this will have a different value.

.. var:: zuul_success

   Post run playbook(s) will be passed this variable to indicate if the run
   phase of the job was successful or not. This variable is meant to be used
   with the `boolean` filter.


Change Items
++++++++++++

A change to the repository.  Most often, this will be a git reference
which has not yet been merged into the repository (e.g., a gerrit
change or a GitHub pull request).  The following additional variables
are available:

.. var:: zuul
   :hidden:

   .. var:: branch

      The target branch of the change (without the `refs/heads/` prefix).

   .. var:: change

      The identifier for the change.

   .. var:: patchset

      The patchset identifier for the change.  If a change is revised,
      this will have a different value.

   .. var:: change_url

      The URL to the source location of the given change.
      E.g., `https://review.example.org/#/c/123456/` or
      `https://github.com/example/example/pull/1234`.

Branch Items
++++++++++++

This represents a branch tip.  This item may have been enqueued
because the branch was updated (via a change having merged, or a
direct push).  Or it may have been enqueued by a timer for the purpose
of verifying the current condition of the branch.  The following
additional variables are available:

.. var:: zuul
   :hidden:

   .. var:: branch

      The name of the item's branch (without the `refs/heads/`
      prefix).

   .. var:: oldrev

      If the item was enqueued as the result of a change merging or
      being pushed to the branch, the git sha of the old revision will
      be included here.  Otherwise, this variable will be undefined.

   .. var:: newrev

      If the item was enqueued as the result of a change merging or
      being pushed to the branch, the git sha of the new revision will
      be included here.  Otherwise, this variable will be undefined.

Tag Items
+++++++++

This represents a git tag.  The item may have been enqueued because a
tag was created or deleted.  The following additional variables are
available:

.. var:: zuul
   :hidden:

   .. var:: tag

      The name of the item's tag (without the `refs/tags/` prefix).

   .. var:: oldrev

      If the item was enqueued as the result of a tag being deleted,
      the previous git sha of the tag will be included here.  If the
      tag was created, this variable will be undefined.

   .. var:: newrev

      If the item was enqueued as the result of a tag being created,
      the new git sha of the tag will be included here.  If the tag
      was deleted, this variable will be undefined.

Ref Items
+++++++++

This represents a git reference that is neither a change, branch, or
tag.  Note that all items include a `ref` attribute which may be used
to identify the ref.  The following additional variables are
available:

.. var:: zuul
   :hidden:

   .. var:: oldrev

      If the item was enqueued as the result of a ref being deleted,
      the previous git sha of the ref will be included here.  If the
      ref was created, this variable will be undefined.

   .. var:: newrev

      If the item was enqueued as the result of a ref being created,
      the new git sha of the ref will be included here.  If the ref
      was deleted, this variable will be undefined.

Working Directory
+++++++++++++++++

Additionally, some information about the working directory and the
executor running the job is available:

.. var:: zuul
   :hidden:

   .. var:: executor

      A number of values related to the executor running the job are
      available:

      .. var:: hostname

         The hostname of the executor.

      .. var:: src_root

         The path to the source directory.

      .. var:: log_root

         The path to the logs directory.

      .. var:: work_root

         The path to the working directory.

.. _user_sitewide_variables:

Site-wide Variables
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Zuul administrator may define variables which will be available to
all jobs running in the system.  These are statically defined and may
not be altered by jobs.  See the :ref:`Administrator's Guide
<admin_sitewide_variables>` for information on how a site
administrator may define these variables.

Parent Job Results
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A job may return data to Zuul for later use by jobs which depend on
it.  For details, see :ref:`return_values`.

SSH Keys
--------

Zuul starts each job with an SSH agent running and the key used to
access the job's nodes added to that agent.  Generally you won't need
to be aware of this since Ansible will use this when performing any
tasks on remote nodes.  However, under some circumstances you may want
to interact with the agent.  For example, you may wish to add a key
provided as a secret to the job in order to access a specific host, or
you may want to, in a pre-playbook, replace the key used to log into
the assigned nodes in order to further protect it from being abused by
untrusted job content.

.. TODO: describe standard lib and link to published docs for it.

.. _return_values:

Return Values
-------------

A job may return some values to Zuul to affect its behavior and for
use by other jobs..  To return a value, use the ``zuul_return``
Ansible module in a job playbook.  For example:

.. code-block:: yaml

  tasks:
    - zuul_return:
        data:
          foo: bar

Will return the dictionary ``{'foo': 'bar'}`` to Zuul.

.. TODO: xref to section describing formatting

To set the log URL for a build, use *zuul_return* to set the
**zuul.log_url** value.  For example:

.. code-block:: yaml

  tasks:
    - zuul_return:
        data:
          zuul:
            log_url: http://logs.example.com/path/to/build/logs

Any values other than those in the ``zuul`` hierarchy will be supplied
as Ansible variables to child jobs.  These variables have less
precedence than any other type of variable in Zuul, so be sure their
names are not shared by any job variables.  If more than one parent
job returns the same variable, the value from the later job in the job
graph will take precedence.