Tugboat Configuration

The following attributes control how a Service is built:

Key Type Description
image String The Docker image to use for this Service
checkout Boolean Whether to clone the git repository to this Service
checkout_path String Where to clone the git repository
depends List List of other Services that this Service depends on
commands List List of commands to run for various build stages
visualdiffs List List of visualdiffs to generate for the Service

The following attributes configure how Service URLs are generated

Key Type Description
aliases List A list of aliases to generate URLs for
alias_type String What kind of aliases to generate
subpath Boolean Whether subpath URLs should be generated for this Service

The following attributes configure how the Tugboat proxy routes HTTP requests to the Service:

Key Type Description
expose Integer Which port the Service should expose to the Tugboat proxy
default Boolean Whether this is the default Service for a Preview.
http Boolean Whether the Service should be available via HTTP
https Boolean Whether the Service should be available via HTTPS
domain String A custom domain for Tugboat to generate URLs with
subpath_map Boolean Whether to map the generated subpath to “/”

alias_type

  • Type: String
  • Default: default
  • Required: No

What type of URL aliases to generate for the Service. Valid options are default or domain. Alias URLs are generated in addition to the normal Service URLs.

default

When alias_type is set to default, the alias URLs are constructed by substituting the preview name in the Service URL with the values of aliases. The values of aliases are sanitized based on the value of subpath.

If subpath is false, alias values are sanitized to create a valid host name, and is truncated to 30 characters, to make the host name a maximum of 63 characters. If subpath is true, the alias values are URL encoded.

If aliases is set to ['foo', 'bar'], alias URLs look like the following

or

domain

When alias_type is set to domain, the alias URLs are constructing by substituting the domain part of the Service URL with the values of aliases. The alias values are sanitized to create a valid domain name. If aliases is set to ['foo.com', 'bar.com'], alias URLs look like the following

or

In order for these domains to resolve, a DNS entry must be added to the alias domains as a CNAME to previews.tugboat.qa. A wildcard entry is required if subpath is set to false.

aliases

  • Type: List
  • Default: no default
  • Required: No

A list of aliases to generate URLs for. If set, additional alias URLs will be generated for the service. These URLs can be used to route to different endpoints inside of the Service, such as for a Drupal Multisite. How the alias URLs are constructed depend on the value of alias_type

checkout

  • Type: Boolean
  • Default: false (true when default: true is set)
  • Required: No

Whether or not this Service should have a copy of the git repository cloned into it.

checkout_path

  • Type: String
  • Default: /var/lib/tugboat
  • Required: No

Specifies the path where the git repository should be cloned if checkout: true is set. If this path already exists, the clone will fail.

commands

  • Type: List
  • Default: no default
  • Required: No

A set of commands to run during various points in a Preview’s lifecycle. These commands are divided into the following stages. Each stage consists of a list of commands. Each command is run in its own context, so things like changing directories does not “stick” between commands. If that behavior is required, an external script should be called.

See also: Service Commands and Building a Preview -> The build process: explained

Stage Description
init Commands that set up the basic Preview infrastructure, such as required packages or tools
update Commands that import data or other assets into a service, such as a database or image files
build Commands that build or generate the site, such as compiling Sass or running database updates from code
ready Commands that indicate that a service is “ready”, such as checking for a listening TCP port
online Commands to run once, after a Preview has built, is online, and is ready to accept incoming requests
start Commands that should be run every time a Preview starts
clone Commands that should be run on the cloned (new) Preview that has been created from an existing Preview

The init, update, and build stages are related as follows:

  • When a Preview is created, the commands in init are run, followed by the commands in update, and finally the commands in build.

  • When a Preview is refreshed, the commands in update are run, followed by the commands in build.

  • When a Preview is created from a Base Preview, only the commands in build are run.

The online, start, and clone commands all run after the build snapshot, so these commands are executed after the build is complete (although cloneed commands are committed as a second build snapshot). For more info on the build snapshot, see: The Build Snapshot.

default

  • Type: Boolean
  • Default: false (true if only one service is defined)
  • Required: Yes, if more than one service is defined.

Whether this is the default Service for a Preview. The default Service is where incoming HTTP requests to the preview URL are routed. Setting this to true also implies expose: 80 and checkout: true unless those attributes are explicitly set otherwise.

depends

  • Type: List
  • Default: no default
  • Required: No

Defines the order in which commands are executed between the defined Services. If one Service has a dependency on another, it will wait for that Service’s commands to run before running its own commands. If not set, there is no guaranteed order in which Services will execute their commands relative to other Services.

domain

  • Type: String
  • Default: no default
  • Required: No

A custom domain to use when generating URLs for the Service. If example.com is used, for example, URLs for the service will resemble http://pr123-token.example.com or http://preview.example.com/pr123-token/, depending on the other configuration values. Note that using a custom domain will result in browsers issuing SSL/TLS certificate warnings when combined with https: true.

expose

  • Type: Integer
  • Default: no default (80 when default: true is set)
  • Required: No

If this Service should be publicly accessible via HTTP/HTTPS, this is the port that the Tugboat Proxy will forward incoming requests to.

http

  • Type: Boolean
  • Default: false
  • Required: No

By default, Tugboat only generates HTTPS URLs and forces a redirect to HTTPS. Setting this value to true changes this behavior to allow access to this Service’s URL directly via HTTP on port 80.

https

  • Type: Boolean
  • Default: true
  • Required: No

When true, this Service’s URL is public accessible via HTTPS on port 443. In order to disable HTTPS for a Service URL, https must be set to false, and http must be set to true. If both https and http are set to true, you’ll get both http and https links.

image

  • Type: String
  • Default: no default
  • Required: Yes

The Docker image to use for this Service. Tugboat maintains a set of images on Dockerhub. These images all extend the official docker images, and are configured to work well with Tugboat. See also: Specify a Service image.

subpath

  • Type: Boolean
  • Default: false
  • Required: No

When true, the URL generated for this Service will be a subpath of the root Preview domain instead of a subdomain. Using a subpath URL is not common, but can solve problems with testing advertisements or using OAuth

subpath URL Example
true https://preview.tugboat.qa/pr123-4vdrhxvyddvr5tne7zcr4y72vzowqohj/
false https://pr123-4vdrhxvyddvr5tne7zcr4y72vzowqohj.tugboat.qa

subpath_map

  • Type: Boolean
  • Default: true
  • Required: No

When true, and subpath: true is set, URLs are rewritten by the Tugboat Proxy to replace the Preview-specific path with / before being forwarded to the Service. When false, URLs are passed through as-is.

visualdiffs

  • Type: List
  • Default: no default
  • Required: No

A set of visual diffs that should be generated for the Service. These visual diffs are generated automatically when a Preview is created with a base preview. They are then updated when the Preview is refreshed or rebuilt.

The visual diffs are specified by providing a list of relative URLs to the Service. Each item in this list can be either a string, such as /blog, or a map overriding the following screenshot options:

Option Default Description
url none The relative URL to create the visual diff for. This option is required
aliases :default Only create visual diffs for these Service aliases. The special :default alias can be used to also generate a visual diff without an alias
timeout 30 How long to wait for a page to be ready when taking a screenshot, in seconds. Minimum: 1, Maximum: 300
waitUntil load Which event to wait for before creating a screenshot of a page.
fullPage true Disable this to use an alternate screenshot method that is more friendly to elements that have vh CSS styles

The waitUntil option can be one of the following events. If a list of events is given, the screenshot is created after all of the listed events have fired

Event Description
load Fires when the load event is fired
domcontentloaded Fires when the DOMContentLoaded event is fired
networkidle0 Fires when there are no more than 0 network connections for at least 500ms
networkidle2 Fires when there are no more than 2 network connections for at least 500ms

The visual diff URLs can optionally be grouped by Service alias, which is convenient when aliases have different URL structures. Group URLs by nesting them in a map with the name of the alias they belong to. The special :default alias can be used to create a group of URLs that should not use an alias.