Update multiple versions based on a global stack version definition

[andreabettich]

Hi there.
I am trying to have a central place where I can define which library, image etc. version are for a specific stack version .
So that way we can create a new version of the stack definition and let renovate make PR on all the repos to update the stack libraries, images etc.
I hope this was sort of understandable. If not I can describe it in a further comment a little more.
Is there a solution for this? If not I'm also willing to build it and create a PR but I would need someone to lead me into the right direction and maybe explain me some parts of the application.

[viceice]

Please explain this more derailed.

• What type of files should updated?
• Where to lookup the new versions?
• Which language / environment is this?
• What is a stack in that context?

[viceice]

Some pseudo code for your sample or a public sample repo would help too

[andreabettich]

Thanks for the fast reply.
I'll try to give you more insight on the whole idea.

What type of files should updated?

The already supported files/managers like pom.xml, dockerfile, gitlab-ci.yaml etc. and maybe an extra file where the stack version is defined.

Where to lookup the new versions?

The current idea was, that we have a git repository which has git tags of the different stack versions and there you have a definition which version of which type of dependency you have.
The file could look like something like this.

version 1.0.0 of a stack

components:
  maven:
    - name: spring-boot-starter-parent
      package: org.springframework.boot
      version: 2.4.0
    - name: foo-bar-security-library
      package: ch.foo.bar
      version: 1.0.0
  docker:
    - name: openjdk
      version: 11-jre
  helm-requirements:
    - name: redis
      version: 6.0.0

In the consumer repository there would be a file which could look as simple as this:

stack:
  version: 1.0.0
  repository: foo/bar/backend-stack-version

And if we have a update on the foo-bar-security-library or on any other component, we can create a new stack version 1.0.1, update the library version and let renovate make a PR on all repos that there is a new stack version.
I think the tricky part is, that we have to update the stack version and then also lookup the new file and update the different files (pom, helm etc)

Which language / environment is this?

Don't know what you mean with this question.
We have a self-hostet instance (bot) on gitlab.

What is a stack in that context?

A stack in our context is just a compilation of compatible components. Like a parent pom in maven where the versions are defined just in our case we want to define it more globally over multiple technologies (maven, docker, helm).

I hope this give you a little more infos about the functionality we are looking for.

[viceice]

Use the regex manager

[andreabettich]

I will implement that in our POC repos and discuss it with some people from the team and will get back to you.
Thanks already for investing your time into the idea.

[andreabettich]

I implemented the solution described and I think there is some room for improvement. Maybe there is a fix for it but maybe it's intended that it's that way.

Renovate now checks if there is a new stack file in a third repository and creates a PR when there is something new. But then it would be nice if the new stack file, with some new packageRules, would get pulled and those dependancies are also upgraded in the same PR.
Is it even possible to let it use the renovate.json from the branch or is it always coming from master? I would guess that it's intended for security reasons but maybe I'm wrong.

[viceice]

it will always pull from default branch (can be any branch set as default)

[andreabettich]

Just found this issue which sounds like what I'm trying to do.
#2496

[andreabettich]

Thanks for the suggestion and your time. We will roll with the solution we discusses or you suggested.
I think we can put this discussion as answered.