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GitLab

Uploads administration (FREE SELF)

Uploads represent all user data that may be sent to GitLab as a single file. As an example, avatars and notes' attachments are uploads. Uploads are integral to GitLab functionality, and therefore cannot be disabled.

Using local storage

This is the default configuration. To change the location where the uploads are stored locally, use the steps in this section based on your installation method:

NOTE: For historical reasons, instance level uploads (for example the favicon) are stored into a base directory, which by default is uploads/-/system. It is strongly discouraged to change the base directory on an existing GitLab installation.

In Omnibus GitLab installations:

The uploads are stored by default in /var/opt/gitlab/gitlab-rails/uploads.

  1. To change the storage path for example to /mnt/storage/uploads, edit /etc/gitlab/gitlab.rb and add the following line:

    gitlab_rails['uploads_directory'] = "/mnt/storage/uploads"

    This setting only applies if you haven't changed the gitlab_rails['uploads_storage_path'] directory.

  2. Save the file and reconfigure GitLab for the changes to take effect.

In installations from source:

The uploads are stored by default in /home/git/gitlab/public/uploads.

  1. To change the storage path for example to /mnt/storage/uploads, edit /home/git/gitlab/config/gitlab.yml and add or amend the following lines:

    uploads:
  storage_path: /mnt/storage
  base_dir: uploads

  2. Save the file and restart GitLab for the changes to take effect.

Using object storage (FREE SELF)

Notes:

If you don't want to use the local disk where GitLab is installed to store the uploads, you can use an object storage provider like AWS S3 instead. This configuration relies on valid AWS credentials to be configured already.

Read more about using object storage with GitLab.

We recommend using the consolidated object storage settings. The following instructions apply to the original configuration format.

Object Storage Settings

For source installations the following settings are nested under uploads: and then object_store:. On Omnibus GitLab installs they are prefixed by uploads_object_store_.

Setting Description Default
enabled Enable/disable object storage false
remote_directory The bucket name where Uploads will be stored
direct_upload Set to true to remove Puma from the Upload path. Workhorse handles the actual Artifact Upload to Object Storage while Puma does minimal processing to keep track of the upload. There is no need for local shared storage. The option may be removed if support for a single storage type for all files is introduced. Read more on direct upload. false
background_upload Set to false to disable automatic upload. Option may be removed once upload is direct to S3 (if direct_upload is set to true it will override background_upload) true
proxy_download Set to true to enable proxying all files served. Option allows to reduce egress traffic as this allows clients to download directly from remote storage instead of proxying all data false
connection Various connection options described below

Connection settings

See the available connection settings for different providers.

In Omnibus installations:

The uploads are stored by default in /var/opt/gitlab/gitlab-rails/uploads.

  1. Edit /etc/gitlab/gitlab.rb and add the following lines by replacing with the values you want:

    gitlab_rails['uploads_object_store_enabled'] = true
gitlab_rails['uploads_object_store_remote_directory'] = "uploads"
gitlab_rails['uploads_object_store_connection'] = {
  'provider' => 'AWS',
  'region' => 'eu-central-1',
  'aws_access_key_id' => 'AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID',
  'aws_secret_access_key' => 'AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY'
}

    If you are using AWS IAM profiles, be sure to omit the AWS access key and secret access key/value pairs.

    gitlab_rails['uploads_object_store_connection'] = {
  'provider' => 'AWS',
  'region' => 'eu-central-1',
  'use_iam_profile' => true
}

  2. Save the file and reconfigure GitLab for the changes to take effect.

  3. Migrate any existing local uploads to the object storage using gitlab:uploads:migrate Rake task.

  4. Optional: Verify all files migrated properly. From PostgreSQL console (sudo gitlab-psql -d gitlabhq_production) verify objectstg below (where store=2) has count of all artifacts:

    gitlabhq_production=# SELECT count(*) AS total, sum(case when store = '1' then 1 else 0 end) AS filesystem, sum(case when store = '2' then 1 else 0 end) AS objectstg FROM uploads;

total | filesystem | objectstg
------+------------+-----------
 2409 |          0 |      2409

    Verify no files on disk in artifacts folder:

    sudo find /var/opt/gitlab/gitlab-rails/uploads -type f | grep -v tmp | wc -l

In installations from source:

The uploads are stored by default in /home/git/gitlab/public/uploads.

  1. Edit /home/git/gitlab/config/gitlab.yml and add or amend the following lines:

    uploads:
  object_store:
    enabled: true
    remote_directory: "uploads" # The bucket name
    connection:
      provider: AWS # Only AWS supported at the moment
      aws_access_key_id: AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID
      aws_secret_access_key: AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY
      region: eu-central-1

  2. Save the file and restart GitLab for the changes to take effect.

  3. Migrate any existing local uploads to the object storage using gitlab:uploads:migrate:all Rake task.

  4. Optional: Verify all files migrated properly. From PostgreSQL console (sudo -u git -H psql -d gitlabhq_production) verify objectstg below (where file_store=2) has count of all artifacts:

    gitlabhq_production=# SELECT count(*) AS total, sum(case when store = '1' then 1 else 0 end) AS filesystem, sum(case when store = '2' then 1 else 0 end) AS objectstg FROM uploads;

total | filesystem | objectstg
------+------------+-----------
 2409 |          0 |      2409

    Verify no files on disk in artifacts folder:

    sudo find /var/opt/gitlab/gitlab-rails/uploads -type f | grep -v tmp | wc -l

OpenStack example

In Omnibus installations:

The uploads are stored by default in /var/opt/gitlab/gitlab-rails/uploads.

  1. Edit /etc/gitlab/gitlab.rb and add the following lines by replacing with the values you want:

    gitlab_rails['uploads_object_store_remote_directory'] = "OPENSTACK_OBJECT_CONTAINER_NAME"
gitlab_rails['uploads_object_store_connection'] = {
 'provider' => 'OpenStack',
 'openstack_username' => 'OPENSTACK_USERNAME',
 'openstack_api_key' => 'OPENSTACK_PASSWORD',
 'openstack_temp_url_key' => 'OPENSTACK_TEMP_URL_KEY',
 'openstack_auth_url' => 'https://auth.cloud.ovh.net/v2.0/',
 'openstack_region' => 'DE1',
 'openstack_tenant' => 'TENANT_ID',
}

  2. Save the file and reconfigure GitLab for the changes to take effect.

  3. Migrate any existing local uploads to the object storage using gitlab:uploads:migrate:all Rake task.

  4. Optional: Verify all files migrated properly. From PostgreSQL console (sudo gitlab-psql -d gitlabhq_production) verify objectstg below (where store=2) has count of all artifacts:

    gitlabhq_production=# SELECT count(*) AS total, sum(case when store = '1' then 1 else 0 end) AS filesystem, sum(case when store = '2' then 1 else 0 end) AS objectstg FROM uploads;

total | filesystem | objectstg
------+------------+-----------
 2409 |          0 |      2409

    Verify no files on disk in artifacts folder:

    sudo find /var/opt/gitlab/gitlab-rails/uploads -type f | grep -v tmp | wc -l

In installations from source:

The uploads are stored by default in /home/git/gitlab/public/uploads.

  1. Edit /home/git/gitlab/config/gitlab.yml and add or amend the following lines:

    uploads:
  object_store:
    enabled: true
    direct_upload: false
    background_upload: true
    proxy_download: false
    remote_directory: OPENSTACK_OBJECT_CONTAINER_NAME
    connection:
      provider: OpenStack
      openstack_username: OPENSTACK_USERNAME
      openstack_api_key: OPENSTACK_PASSWORD
      openstack_temp_url_key: OPENSTACK_TEMP_URL_KEY
      openstack_auth_url: 'https://auth.cloud.ovh.net/v2.0/'
      openstack_region: DE1
      openstack_tenant: 'TENANT_ID'

  2. Save the file and reconfigure GitLab for the changes to take effect.

  3. Migrate any existing local uploads to the object storage using gitlab:uploads:migrate:all Rake task.

  4. Optional: Verify all files migrated properly. From PostgreSQL console (sudo -u git -H psql -d gitlabhq_production) verify objectstg below (where file_store=2) has count of all artifacts:

    gitlabhq_production=# SELECT count(*) AS total, sum(case when store = '1' then 1 else 0 end) AS filesystem, sum(case when store = '2' then 1 else 0 end) AS objectstg FROM uploads;

total | filesystem | objectstg
------+------------+-----------
 2409 |          0 |      2409

    Verify no files on disk in artifacts folder:

    sudo find /var/opt/gitlab/gitlab-rails/uploads -type f | grep -v tmp | wc -l