Using codemagic.yaml

Configure all your workflows in a single file

codemagic.yaml is a highly customizable configuration file for setting up your CI/CD pipeline with Codemagic. Configure all your workflows in a single file and commit the file to version control.

Building with YAML

In order to use codemagic.yaml for build configuration on Codemagic, it has to be committed to your repository. The name of the file must be codemagic.yaml and it must be located in the root directory of the repository.

When detected in the repository, codemagic.yaml is automatically used for configuring builds triggered in response to the events defined in the file, provided that a webhook is set up.

Builds can also be started manually by clicking Start new build in Codemagic and selecting the branch and workflow to build in the Specify build configuration popup.

Syntax

You can readily commit codemagic.yaml with the following content to test it out:

workflows:
  hello-world:
    name: Hello world workflow
    scripts:
        - echo "Hello World!"

The scripts in the scripts section will be run right after the repository is cloned.

codemagic.yaml follows the traditional YAML syntax. Here are a few tips and tricks on how to better structure the file.

Section names

For easier reading of the configuration file and build logs, you can divide the scripts into meaningful sections with descriptive names.

scripts:
  - name: Build for iOS         # Name of the section
    script: flutter build ios   # The script(s) to be run in that section

Reusing sections

If a particular section would be reused multiple times in the file, e.g. in each workflow, you can avoid repetitions by using anchors. This is also convenient when you need to make changes to the code, as you would have to edit it in just one place.

Define the section to be reused by adding & in front of it.

scripts:
  - &increment_build_number       # Defined section
    name: Increment build number
    script: agvtool new-version -all $(($PROJECT_BUILD_NUMBER +1))

Reuse the defined section elsewhere by adding a * in front of it.

scripts:
  - script1
  - *increment_build_number       # Reused section
  - script3

Template

This is the skeleton structure of codemagic.yaml. Each section, along with the configuration options, is described in more detail

workflows:
  my-workflow:
    name: My workflow name
    instance_type: mac_mini
    max_build_duration: 60
    environment:
      groups:
        - group_name
      vars:
        PUBLIC_ENV_VAR: "value here"
      flutter: stable
      xcode: latest
    cache:
      cache_paths:
        - ~/.pub-cache
    triggering:
      events:
        - push
      branch_patterns:
        - pattern: '*'
          include: true
          source: true
      cancel_previous_builds: false
    scripts:
      - ...
    artifacts:
      - build/**/outputs/bundle/**/*.aab
    publishing:
      email:
        recipients:
          - name@example.com
      scripts:
        - echo 'Post-publish script'

Workflows

You can use codemagic.yaml to define several workflows for building a project. Each workflow describes the entire build pipeline from triggers to publishing. For example, you may want to have separate workflows for developing, testing, and publishing the app.

workflows:
  my-workflow:                # workflow ID
    name: My workflow name    # workflow name displayed in Codemagic UI
    instance_type: mac_mini   # machine instance type
    max_build_duration: 60    # build duration in minutes (min 1, max 120)
    environment:
    cache:
    triggering:
    scripts:
    artifacts:
    publishing:

The main sections in each workflow are described below.

Instance Type

instance_type: specifies the build machine type to use for the build. The supported build machines are:

Environment

environment: specifies the environment variables, variable groups and build machine software versions.

Environment variable groups

The snippet below shows how to import environment variable groups defined in the team settings and application settings and also how to define them in the cofiguration file, such as credentials and API keys required for code signing. Click Secure to encrypt the values. Note that binary files have to be base64 encoded locally before they can be saved to environment variables and decoded during the build.

environment:
  groups:             # Define your environment variables groups here
    - keystore_credentials
    - app_store_credentials
    - manual_cert_credentials
    - firebase_credentials
    - other
    
    # Android code signing - Add the keystore_credentials group environment variables in Codemagic UI (either in Application/Team variables)
    # FCI_KEYSTORE
    # FCI_KEYSTORE_PASSWORD
    # FCI_KEY_PASSWORD
    # FCI_KEY_ALIAS

    # iOS automatic code signing - Add the app_store_credentials group environment variables in Codemagic UI (either in Application/Team variables)
    # APP_STORE_CONNECT_ISSUER_ID
    # APP_STORE_CONNECT_KEY_IDENTIFIER
    # APP_STORE_CONNECT_PRIVATE_KEY
    # CERTIFICATE_PRIVATE_KEY

    # iOS manual code signing - Add the manual_cert_credentials group environment variables in Codemagic UI (either in Application/Team variables)
    # FCI_CERTIFICATE
    # FCI_CERTIFICATE_PASSWORD
    # FCI_PROVISIONING_PROFILE

    # Firebase secrets - Add the firebase_credentials group environment variables in Codemagic UI (either in Application/Team variables
    # ANDROID_FIREBASE_SECRET
    # IOS_FIREBASE_SECRET
    
    # Add the other group environment variables in Codemagic UI (either in Application/Team variables
    # SSH_KEY_GITHUB     # defining an ssh key used to download private dependencies
    # CREDENTIALS        # publishing a package to pub.dev
    # APP_CENTER_TOKEN   # publishing an application to App Center

Workflow environment variables

The snippet below shows how to define workflow specific public environment variables.

environment:
  vars:             # Define your environment variables here
    PUBLIC_ENV_VAR: "value here"

Build machine and software versions

The snippet below shows how to specify the versions of Flutter, Xcode, CocoaPods, Node, npm, ndk, Java and Ruby used in the build.

environment:
  flutter: stable   # Define the channel name or version (e.g. v1.13.4)
  xcode: latest     # Define latest, edge or version (e.g. 11.2)
  cocoapods: 1.9.1  # Define default or version
  node: 12.14.0     # Define default, latest, current, lts, carbon (or another stream), nightly or version
  npm: 6.13.7       # Define default, latest, next, lts or version
  ndk: r21d         # Define default or revision (e.g. r19c)
  java: 1.8         # Define default, or platform version (e.g. 11)
  ruby: 2.7.2       # Define default or version

Environment section example

You can freely use all of the above features of environment section in conjunction.

environment:
  vars: # Define your public environment variables here
    PUBLIC_ENV_VAR: "value here"
  groups: # Import UI defined environment variable groups(either in Application/Team variables) here
    - staging
  xcode: latest # Define latest, edge or version (e.g. 11.2)
  flutter: stable   # Define the channel name or version (e.g. v1.13.4)

Cache

cache: defines the paths to be cached and stored on Codemagic. For example, you may consider caching the following paths:

cache:
  cache_paths:
    - ~/.gradle/caches
    - ...

Triggering

triggering: defines the events for automatic build triggering and watched branches. If no events are defined, you can start builds only manually.

A branch pattern can match the name of a particular branch, or you can use wildcard symbols to create a pattern that matches several branches. Note that for pull request builds, you have to specify whether the watched branch is the source or the target of the pull request.

To avoid running builds on outdated commits, you can set cancel_previous_builds to automatically cancel all ongoing and queued builds triggered by webhooks on push or pull request commit when a more recent build has been triggered for the same branch.

triggering:
  events:                       # List the events that trigger builds
    - push
    - pull_request
    - tag
  branch_patterns:              # Include or exclude watched branches
    - pattern: '*'
      include: true
      source: true
    - pattern: excluded-target
      include: false
      source: false
    - pattern: included-source
      include: true
      source: true
  tag_patterns:                 # Include or exlude watched tag labels
    - pattern: '*'
      include: true
    - pattern: excluded-tag
      include: false
    - pattern: included-tag
      include: true
  cancel_previous_builds: false  # Set to `true` to automatically cancel outdated webhook builds

Scripts

Scripts specify what kind of application is built. This is where you can specify the commands to test, build and code sign your project (see our documentation for iOS code signing and Android code signing). You can also run shell (sh) scripts directly in your .yaml file, or run scripts in other languages by defining the language with a shebang line or by launching a script file present in your repository.

When you set ignore_failure to true, the workflow will continue to run even if the script fails.

scripts:
  - echo "single line script"
  - name: Flutter test
    script: flutter test
    ignore_failure: true
  - |
    #!/usr/bin/env python3

    print('Multiline python script')    
  - name: Build for iOS
    script: flutter build ios

There are example scripts available for building a Flutter application, React Native application, native Android application or a native iOS application.

Artifacts

Configure the paths and names of the artifacts you would like to use in the following steps, e.g. for publishing, or have available for download on the build page. All paths are relative to the clone directory, but absolute paths are supported as well. You can also use environment variables in artifact patterns.

artifacts:
  - build/**/outputs/apk/**/*.apk                   # relative path for a project in root directory
  - subfolder_name/build/**/outputs/apk/**/*.apk    # relative path for a project in subfolder
  - build/**/outputs/**/*.aab
  - build/**/outputs/**/mapping.txt
  - build/ios/ipa/*.ipa
  - build/macos/**/*.pkg
  - /tmp/xcodebuild_logs/*.log
  - flutter_drive.log

There are several things to keep in mind about patterns:

• The pattern can match several files or folders. If it picks up files or folders with the same name, the top level file or folder name will be suffixed with _{number}.
• If one of the patterns includes another pattern, duplicate artifacts are not created.
• apk, aab, aar, ipa, app, pkg, proguard mapping (mapping.txt), flutter_drive.log, jar, zip, xarchive and dSYM.zip files will be available as separate items in the Artifacts section on the build page. The rest of the artifacts will be included in an archive with the following name pattern: {project-name}_{version}_artifacts.zip.

Publishing

Codemagic has a number of integrations (e.g. email, Slack, Google Play, App Store Connect) for publishing but you can also publish elsewhere with custom scripts (e.g. Firebase App Distribution). See the examples here.

Note that by default the publishing scripts are run regardless of the build status. You can specify additional conditions with if statements.

publishing:
  email:
    recipients:
      - name@example.com
  scripts:
    name: Check for apk
    script: |
      apkPath=$(find build -name "*.apk" | head -1)
      if [[ -z ${apkPath} ]]
      then
        echo "No .apk were found"
      else
        echo "Publishing .apk artifacts"
      fi      

You can also use the publishing scripts to report build status.

scripts:
  - name: Report build start
    script: # build started

    . . .

  - name: Build finished successfully
    script: touch ~/SUCCESS
publishing:
  scripts:
    - name: Report build status
      script: |
        if [ -a "~/SUCCESS" ] ; then
           # build successful
        else
           # build failed
        fi        

Conditional build triggers

You can skip building particular commits or watch for changes in specific files to trigger builds. In addition, it’s possible to define build conditions per workflow or specific build steps.

Skip building a commit

If you do not wish Codemagic to build a particular commit, include [skip ci] or [ci skip] in your commit message.

Watch for changes in files

You can avoid unnecessary builds when functional components of your repository were not modified. Use conditional workflow triggering to skip building the workflow if the watched files were not updated since the last successful build.

You should specify the files to watch in changeset by using the includes and excludes keys.

workflows:
  build-app:
    name: Build App
    triggering:
      events:
        - push
    when:
      changeset:
        includes:
          - '.'
        excludes:
          - '**/*.md'

In this case, the build would be skipped if there were changes only to Markdown files .md.

Note that codemagic.yaml is always included in the changeset by default.

Both keys includes and excludes in changeset are optional. If the includes key is not specified, its value will default to '.'. The excludes key defaults to no exclusions.

If you use a monorepo, each workflow could be responsible for building a part of your application. Use conditional workflow triggering and specify the path to the application in the changeset as in the example below.

workflows:
  build-android:
    name: Build Android
    triggering:
      events:
        - push
    when:
      changeset:
        includes:
          - 'android/'

As a result, commits with changes outside of the android folder will not trigger a build.

Conditional build step execution

You may also want to skip some specific steps when building your application. Use the same approach with scripts.

workflows:
  build-android:
    name: Build All
    scripts:
      - name: Build Android
        script: ./gradlew assembleDebug
        when:
          changeset:
            includes:
              - 'android/'
            excludes:
              - '**/*.md'

Working directory

You may select a working directory globally for the entire workflow or individual scripts only. If not specified, the global working directory defaults to the directory where the repository is cloned (/Users/builder/clone). You can override the global working directory by specifying the working directory in the individual steps. Consider the example below:

workflows:
  build-apps:
    name: Build iOS and Android
    working_directory: mobile
    scripts:
      - name: Prepare
        script: pwd # current working directory is /Users/builder/clone/mobile
      - name: Build iOS
        working_directory: mobile/ios
        script: pwd # current working directory is /Users/builder/clone/mobile/ios
      - name: Build Android
        working_directory: mobile/android
        script: pwd # current working directory is /Users/builder/clone/mobile/android
      - name: Process Logs
        working_directory: /Users/builder/Library/Logs
        script: pwd # current working directory is /Users/builder/Library/Logs

Working directory paths are relative to the repository clone directory, e.g. if mobile is the working directory, then the script will be executed in /Users/builder/clone/mobile.

Note that you can specify an absolute path as a working directory as well.