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How it works

Summary​

The R2Devops Dashboard uses various calculations with GitLab project CI/CD. The following sections will describe how it works.

CI/CD Engine​

The Dashboard provides an overview of the CI/CD engines utilized within your entire GitLab organization.

CI/CD Engines chart

Its purpose is to identify the CI/CD engines employed within your GitLab Organization and categorize into four different types:

  • GitLab: When a project contains a .gitlab-ci.yml file at its root.
  • Jenkins: When a project contains a JenkinsFile at the root, and/or a webhook, and/or a GitLab integration.
  • GitHub: When a project contains a .github/workflows directory.
  • No CI/CD: When a project doesn't match any of the previous cases, it's declared as having No CI/CD.

It can assist in:

  • Migrating old CI/CD engine implementations
  • Preventing drift among the CI/CD engines used
  • Identifying projects not utilizing CI/CD
Example

A project could have multiple CI/CD engines. For example, project1 could have:

  • 50% of GitLab
  • 50% of Jenkins

Pipeline Composition​

The Dashboard provides an overview of your entire organization's CI/CD composition.

Pipelines composition chart

Its aim is to identify the types of templates utilized within your organization. For every GitLab project's CI/CD, we count all jobs and categorize them into:

  • Hardcoded Job: A CI/CD job directly hardcoded inside the configuration file.
  • Template: A CI/CD configuration template remotely included.
  • Marketplace Template: A CI/CD configuration template remotely included, present within the R2Devops Marketplace.

This insight serves multiple purposes, such as:

  • Identifying and reducing hardcoded jobs, which can accumulate technical debt.
  • Transitioning to utilizing solely Marketplace templates.
  • Follow adoption of Templates or Marketplace templates of your whole organization.
Example

A project could be composed of a mix of multiple types. For example, project1 could have:

  • 13.3% of Hardcoded Jobs
  • 24.3% of Templates
  • 62.4% of Marketplace Templates

Scores​

The first dashboard tab is the overview page, offering a quick summary of projects within the current organization.

On this page, you'll find two global scores:

Global scores

🛡️ Security Score​

The security score is calculated based on the following criteria:

  • Visibility and protection of CI/CD variables used in the configuration file (see Security/Variables tab)
  • Detection of secrets leaks inside the CI/CD configuration file; we also scan the merged configuration (see Security/Secrets tab)
  • Status of container images used in jobs of the CI/CD configuration file (see Security/Containers tab)

🏆 Maintainability Score​

The maintainability score is calculated based on the following criteria:

  • Number of projects using reusable resources, such as templates and R2Devops templates
  • Number of projects using up-to-date CI/CD resources (see Job Usage tab)

Inside the Projects Table​

The maintainability status displayed on the projects table is based on the composition of the CI/CD configuration file, calculated according to:

  • Compliance with templates and template usage
  • Presence of hardcoded jobs and the number of lines

🤿 More In-Depth​

Weight of Each Criterion​

Each criterion has a weight used to calculate the global score, signifying that some criteria are more impactful than others.

Penalty System​

To account for critical criteria, a penalty system is implemented. If a criterion is not met, the score is reduced by a certain percentage.

Current criteria with penalties:

  • Secrets leaks inside the CI/CD configuration file
  • Container image status declared as unsafe, indicating it comes from a non-official registry inside Docker Hub