Private CI runners
Also known as "Specific Runners", they are required for projects which use secrets or other data which is supposed to remain safe. Read more about it here.
Private Runner deployment should be isolated from Application deployment so both deployments are living their separate lives and they can be maintained properly without affecting each other. There are several options on how or where to install a GitLab runner, the most common being virtual servers/machines or directly to Kubernetes. The official Gitlab installation procedures can be found here.
Requirements
Make sure you have gone through the requirements before proceeding.
Private runners on VM
For a simple example of GitLab runner installation and configuration, terraform and Ansible playbooks can be used. The private runner configuration and registration can vary on implementation, but here is example of an ansible playbook:
---
- name: Read runner reg. token from env
hosts: runners
tasks:
- set_fact:
gitlab_reg_token: "{{ lookup('env', 'GIT_REG_TOKEN') }}"
- name: Download gitlab runner package
hosts: runners
become: yes
vars:
gitlab_runner_coordinator_url: https://gitlab.tools.in.pan-net.eu/
gitlab_runner_registration_token: "{{ gitlab_reg_token }}"
gitlab_runner_tags: ["ghost","cache"]
gitlab_runner_executor: docker
gitlab_runner_docker_image: artifactory.tools.in.pan-net.eu/docker/alpine:latest
gitlab_runner_run_untaged: false
tasks:
- name: download gitlab runner package
get_url:
url: https://gitlab-runner-downloads.s3.amazonaws.com/latest/deb/gitlab-runner_amd64.deb
dest: /home/ubuntu/
use_proxy: yes
- name: install gitlab runner package
apt:
deb: /home/ubuntu/gitlab-runner_amd64.deb
state: present
- name: Check if runner is registered with gitlab
command:
gitlab-runner verify
register: runner_status
changed_when: False
failed_when: False
check_mode: False
- name: Register runner with GitLab
command: gitlab-runner register >
--non-interactive
--url '{{ gitlab_runner_coordinator_url }}'
--registration-token '{{ gitlab_runner_registration_token }}'
--description '{{ ansible_hostname }}'
--tag-list '{{ gitlab_runner_tags | join(",") }}'
--executor '{{ gitlab_runner_executor }}'
--docker-image '{{ gitlab_runner_docker_image }}'
--run-untagged={{ gitlab_runner_run_untaged }}
when:
- runner_status.stderr is not search('Verifying runner... is alive')
Variables used for proper set up of Gitlab Runners are defined as vars in the above ansible playbook example.
Private runners on Kubernetes
The easiest way to install GitLab Runner is by using the Helm Chart.
All you need is your Gitlab URL and the runner registration token; adjust the values.yaml file accordingly and follow the step by step procedure which can be found on the official Gitlab documentation page here