Skip to content

Krew Plugin Manifests

After releasing to GitHub or GitLab, GoReleaser can generate and publish a Krew Plugin Manifest into a repository that you have access to.

Check their website for more information.

The krews section specifies how the plugins should be created:

# .goreleaser.yaml
krews:
  -
    # Name of the recipe
    #
    # Default: ProjectName
    # Templates: allowed
    name: myproject

    # IDs of the archives to use.
    ids:
    - foo
    - bar

    # GOARM to specify which 32-bit arm version to use if there are multiple
    # versions from the build section. Krew plugin supports at this moment only
    # one 32-bit version.
    #
    # Default: 6
    goarm: 6

    # GOAMD64 to specify which amd64 version to use if there are multiple
    # versions from the build section.
    #
    # Default: 'v1'
    goamd64: v3

    # NOTE: make sure the url_template, the token and given repo (github or
    # gitlab) owner and name are from the same kind. We will probably unify this
    # in the next major version like it is done with scoop.

    # URL which is determined by the given Token (github or
    # gitlab)
    # Default:
    #   GitHub: 'https://github.com/<repo_owner>/<repo_name>/releases/download/{{ .Tag }}/{{ .ArtifactName }}'
    #   GitLab: 'https://gitlab.com/<repo_owner>/<repo_name>/-/releases/{{ .Tag }}/downloads/{{ .ArtifactName }}'
    #   Gitea: 'https://gitea.com/<repo_owner>/<repo_name>/releases/download/{{ .Tag }}/{{ .ArtifactName }}'
    # Templates: allowed
    url_template: "http://github.mycompany.com/foo/bar/releases/{{ .Tag }}/{{ .ArtifactName }}"

    # Git author used to commit to the repository.
    commit_author:
      name: goreleaserbot
      email: [email protected]

    # The project name and current git tag are used in the format string.
    commit_msg_template: "Krew plugin update for {{ .ProjectName }} version {{ .Tag }}"

    # Your app's homepage.
    homepage: "https://example.com/"

    # Your app's description.
    # The usual guideline for this is to wrap the line at 80 chars.
    #
    # Templates: allowed
    description: "Software to create fast and easy drum rolls."

    # Your app's short description.
    # The usual guideline for this is to be at most 50 chars long.
    #
    # Templates: allowed
    short_description: "Software to create fast and easy drum rolls."

    # Caveats for the user of your binary.
    # The usual guideline for this is to wrap the line at 80 chars.
    caveats: "How to use this binary"

    # Setting this will prevent goreleaser to actually try to commit the updated
    # krew plugin - instead, the plugin file will be stored on the dist folder
    # only, leaving the responsibility of publishing it to the user.
    # If set to auto, the release will not be uploaded to the Krew plugin
    # in case there is an indicator for prerelease in the tag e.g. v1.0.0-rc1
    skip_upload: true

    # Repository to push the generated files to.
    repository:
      # Repository owner.
      #
      # Templates: allowed
      owner: caarlos0

      # Repository name.
      #
      # Templates: allowed
      name: my-repo

      # Optionally a branch can be provided.
      #
      # Default: default repository branch
      # Templates: allowed
      branch: main

      # Optionally a token can be provided, if it differs from the token
      # provided to GoReleaser
      # Templates: allowed
      token: "{{ .Env.GITHUB_PERSONAL_AUTH_TOKEN }}"

      # Sets up pull request creation instead of just pushing to the given branch.
      # Make sure the 'branch' property is different from base before enabling
      # it.
      #
      # Since: v1.17
      pull_request:
        # Whether to enable it or not.
        enabled: true

        # Whether to open the PR as a draft or not.
        #
        # Since: v1.19
        draft: true

        # If the pull request template has checkboxes, enabling this will
        # check all of them.
        #
        # This feature is only available in GoReleaser Pro.
        # Since: v1.20 (pro)
        check_boxes: true

        # Base can also be another repository, in which case the owner and name
        # above will be used as HEAD, allowing cross-repository pull requests.
        #
        # Since: v1.19
        base:
          owner: goreleaser
          name: my-repo
          branch: main

      # Clone, create the file, commit and push, to a regular Git repository.
      #
      # Notice that this will only have any effect if the given URL is not
      # empty.
      #
      # Since: v1.18
      git:
        # The Git URL to push.
        #
        # Templates: allowed
        url: 'ssh://[email protected]:repo.git'

        # The SSH private key that should be used to commit to the Git
        # repository.
        # This can either be a path or the key contents.
        #
        # IMPORTANT: the key must not be password-protected.
        #
        # WARNING: do not expose your private key in the configuration file!
        #
        # Templates: allowed
        private_key: '{{ .Env.PRIVATE_KEY_PATH }}'

        # The value to be passed to `GIT_SSH_COMMAND`.
        # This is mainly used to specify the SSH private key used to pull/push
        # to the Git URL.
        #
        # Default: 'ssh -i {{ .KeyPath }} -o StrictHostKeyChecking=accept-new -F /dev/null'
        # Templates: allowed
        ssh_command: 'ssh -i {{ .Env.KEY }} -o SomeOption=yes'

Tip

Learn more about the name template engine.

Limitations

  • Only one binary per archive is allowed;
  • Binary releases (when archives.format is set to binary) are not allowed;
  • Only one GOARM build is allowed;

Pull Requests

Since v1.17

GoReleaser allows you to, instead of pushing directly to the main branch, push to a feature branch, and open a pull requests with the changes.

Templates

Since v1.19

GoReleaser will check for a .github/PULL_REQUEST_TEMPLATE.md, and set it in the pull request body if it exists.

We do that to prevent extra work for maintainers of things like winget-pkgs, nixpkgs, and so on.

Cross-repository pull requests

Since v1.19

You can also push to a fork, and open the pull request in the original branch.

Here's an example on how to set it up:

# .goreleaser.yml
# ...
something: # can be nix, brews, etc...
  - repository:
      owner: john
      name: repo
      branch: "{{.ProjectName}}-{{.Version}}"
      pull_request:
        enabled: true
        base:
          owner: mike
          name: repo
          branch: main

This will:

  • Create the files into john/repo, in the branch foo-1.2.3 (assuming ProjectName=foo and Version=1.2.3). 1
  • Open a pull request from john/repo into mike/repo, with the branch main as target. 2

Things that don't work

  • GoReleaser will not keep your fork in sync!!! It might or might not be a problem in your case, in which case you'll have to sync it manually.
  • Opening pull requests to a forked repository (go-github does not have the required fields to do it).
  • Since this can fail for a myriad of reasons, if an error happen, it'll log it to the release output, but will not fail the pipeline.

  1. In GitHub's terms, this means head=john:repo:foo-1.2.3 

  2. In GitHub's terms, this means base=mike:repo:main