Environment variables

Woodpecker provides the ability to pass environment variables to individual pipeline steps. Note that these can't overwrite any existing, built-in variables. Example pipeline step with custom environment variables:

 steps:
   - name: build
     image: golang
+    environment:
+      CGO: 0
+      GOOS: linux
+      GOARCH: amd64
     commands:
       - go build
       - go test

Please note that the environment section is not able to expand environment variables. If you need to expand variables they should be exported in the commands section.

 steps:
   - name: build
     image: golang
-    environment:
-      - PATH=$PATH:/go
     commands:
+      - export PATH=$PATH:/go
       - go build
       - go test

warning

${variable} expressions are subject to pre-processing. If you do not want the pre-processor to evaluate your expression it must be escaped:

 steps:
   - name: build
     image: golang
     commands:
-      - export PATH=${PATH}:/go
+      - export PATH=$${PATH}:/go
       - go build
       - go test

Built-in environment variables

This is the reference list of all environment variables available to your pipeline containers. These are injected into your pipeline step and plugins containers, at runtime.

NAME	Description
CI	CI environment name (value: woodpecker)
	Repository
CI_REPO	repository full name <owner>/<name>
CI_REPO_OWNER	repository owner
CI_REPO_NAME	repository name
CI_REPO_REMOTE_ID	repository remote ID, is the UID it has in the forge
CI_REPO_SCM	repository SCM (git)
CI_REPO_URL	repository web URL
CI_REPO_CLONE_URL	repository clone URL
CI_REPO_CLONE_SSH_URL	repository SSH clone URL
CI_REPO_DEFAULT_BRANCH	repository default branch (main)
CI_REPO_PRIVATE	repository is private
CI_REPO_TRUSTED	repository is trusted
	Current Commit
CI_COMMIT_SHA	commit SHA
CI_COMMIT_REF	commit ref
CI_COMMIT_REFSPEC	commit ref spec
CI_COMMIT_BRANCH	commit branch (equals target branch for pull requests)
CI_COMMIT_SOURCE_BRANCH	commit source branch (empty if event is not pull_request or pull_request_closed)
CI_COMMIT_TARGET_BRANCH	commit target branch (empty if event is not pull_request or pull_request_closed)
CI_COMMIT_TAG	commit tag name (empty if event is not tag)
CI_COMMIT_PULL_REQUEST	commit pull request number (empty if event is not pull_request or pull_request_closed)
CI_COMMIT_PULL_REQUEST_LABELS	labels assigned to pull request (empty if event is not pull_request or pull_request_closed)
CI_COMMIT_MESSAGE	commit message
CI_COMMIT_AUTHOR	commit author username
CI_COMMIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL	commit author email address
CI_COMMIT_AUTHOR_AVATAR	commit author avatar
CI_COMMIT_PRERELEASE	release is a pre-release (empty if event is not release)
	Current pipeline
CI_PIPELINE_NUMBER	pipeline number
CI_PIPELINE_PARENT	number of parent pipeline
CI_PIPELINE_EVENT	pipeline event (see pipeline events)
CI_PIPELINE_URL	link to the web UI for the pipeline
CI_PIPELINE_FORGE_URL	link to the forge's web UI for the commit(s) or tag that triggered the pipeline
CI_PIPELINE_DEPLOY_TARGET	pipeline deploy target for deployment events (i.e. production)
CI_PIPELINE_DEPLOY_TASK	pipeline deploy task for deployment events (i.e. migration)
CI_PIPELINE_STATUS	pipeline status (success, failure)
CI_PIPELINE_CREATED	pipeline created UNIX timestamp
CI_PIPELINE_STARTED	pipeline started UNIX timestamp
CI_PIPELINE_FINISHED	pipeline finished UNIX timestamp
CI_PIPELINE_FILES	changed files (empty if event is not push or pull_request), it is undefined if more than 500 files are touched
	Current workflow
CI_WORKFLOW_NAME	workflow name
	Current step
CI_STEP_NAME	step name
CI_STEP_NUMBER	step number
CI_STEP_STATUS	step status (success, failure)
CI_STEP_STARTED	step started UNIX timestamp
CI_STEP_FINISHED	step finished UNIX timestamp
CI_STEP_URL	URL to step in UI
	Previous commit
CI_PREV_COMMIT_SHA	previous commit SHA
CI_PREV_COMMIT_REF	previous commit ref
CI_PREV_COMMIT_REFSPEC	previous commit ref spec
CI_PREV_COMMIT_BRANCH	previous commit branch
CI_PREV_COMMIT_SOURCE_BRANCH	previous commit source branch
CI_PREV_COMMIT_TARGET_BRANCH	previous commit target branch
CI_PREV_COMMIT_URL	previous commit link in forge
CI_PREV_COMMIT_MESSAGE	previous commit message
CI_PREV_COMMIT_AUTHOR	previous commit author username
CI_PREV_COMMIT_AUTHOR_EMAIL	previous commit author email address
CI_PREV_COMMIT_AUTHOR_AVATAR	previous commit author avatar
	Previous pipeline
CI_PREV_PIPELINE_NUMBER	previous pipeline number
CI_PREV_PIPELINE_PARENT	previous pipeline number of parent pipeline
CI_PREV_PIPELINE_EVENT	previous pipeline event (see pipeline events)
CI_PREV_PIPELINE_URL	previous pipeline link in CI
CI_PREV_PIPELINE_FORGE_URL	previous pipeline link to event in forge
CI_PREV_PIPELINE_DEPLOY_TARGET	previous pipeline deploy target for deployment events (ie production)
CI_PREV_PIPELINE_DEPLOY_TASK	previous pipeline deploy task for deployment events (ie migration)
CI_PREV_PIPELINE_STATUS	previous pipeline status (success, failure)
CI_PREV_PIPELINE_CREATED	previous pipeline created UNIX timestamp
CI_PREV_PIPELINE_STARTED	previous pipeline started UNIX timestamp
CI_PREV_PIPELINE_FINISHED	previous pipeline finished UNIX timestamp
CI_WORKSPACE	Path of the workspace where source code gets cloned to
	System
CI_SYSTEM_NAME	name of the CI system: woodpecker
CI_SYSTEM_URL	link to CI system
CI_SYSTEM_HOST	hostname of CI server
CI_SYSTEM_VERSION	version of the server
	Forge
CI_FORGE_TYPE	name of forge (gitea, github, ...)
CI_FORGE_URL	root URL of configured forge
	Internal - Please don't use!
CI_SCRIPT	Internal script path. Used to call pipeline step commands.
CI_NETRC_USERNAME	Credentials for private repos to be able to clone data. (Only available for specific images)
CI_NETRC_PASSWORD	Credentials for private repos to be able to clone data. (Only available for specific images)
CI_NETRC_MACHINE	Credentials for private repos to be able to clone data. (Only available for specific images)

Global environment variables

If you want specific environment variables to be available in all of your pipelines use the WOODPECKER_ENVIRONMENT setting on the Woodpecker server. Note that these can't overwrite any existing, built-in variables.

WOODPECKER_ENVIRONMENT=first_var:value1,second_var:value2

These can be used, for example, to manage the image tag used by multiple projects.

WOODPECKER_ENVIRONMENT=GOLANG_VERSION:1.18

 steps:
   - name: build
-    image: golang:1.18
+    image: golang:${GOLANG_VERSION}
     commands:
       - [...]

String Substitution

Woodpecker provides the ability to substitute environment variables at runtime. This gives us the ability to use dynamic settings, commands and filters in our pipeline configuration.

Example commit substitution:

 steps:
   - name: docker
     image: plugins/docker
     settings:
+      tags: ${CI_COMMIT_SHA}

Example tag substitution:

 steps:
   - name: docker
     image: plugins/docker
     settings:
+      tags: ${CI_COMMIT_TAG}

String Operations

Woodpecker also emulates bash string operations. This gives us the ability to manipulate the strings prior to substitution. Example use cases might include substring and stripping prefix or suffix values.

OPERATION	DESCRIPTION
${param}	parameter substitution
${param,}	parameter substitution with lowercase first char
${param,,}	parameter substitution with lowercase
${param^}	parameter substitution with uppercase first char
${param^^}	parameter substitution with uppercase
${param:pos}	parameter substitution with substring
${param:pos:len}	parameter substitution with substring and length
${param=default}	parameter substitution with default
${param##prefix}	parameter substitution with prefix removal
${param%%suffix}	parameter substitution with suffix removal
${param/old/new}	parameter substitution with find and replace

Example variable substitution with substring:

 steps:
   - name: docker
     image: plugins/docker
     settings:
+      tags: ${CI_COMMIT_SHA:0:8}

Example variable substitution strips v prefix from v.1.0.0:

 steps:
   - name: docker
     image: plugins/docker
     settings:
+      tags: ${CI_COMMIT_TAG##v}