DEV Community

Brandon Rozek
Brandon Rozek

Posted on • Originally published at brandonrozek.com on

Deploying a Lightweight Git Server with CGit using Docker-Compose

#git

In this post, I’ll talk about how we can setup CGit within a docker-compose setup. We’ll be using the ClearLinux CGit container.

Configuring Apache Webserver

Within the CGit container, an apache webserver is setup to execute the CGit CGI scripts. This configuration is very similar to the default one provided by ClearLinux. However, the default holds your repositories in the /cgit subfolder as I wanted it on the root / folder.

/etc/httpd-cgit.conf

ServerName localhost

# Next two lines changed for new document root
DocumentRoot /var/www/cgit
<Directory "/var/www/cgit">
    AllowOverride None
    Options ExecCGI FollowSymLinks
    Require all granted
</Directory>

# cgid module is required to run the cgit binary
LoadModule cgid_module lib/httpd/modules/mod_cgid.so
<IfModule cgid_module>
        ScriptSock /var/run/cgid.sock
</IfModule>

# Path to cgit stylesheet, graphics
Alias /cgit-data /usr/share/cgit
<Directory "/usr/share/cgit">
    AllowOverride None
    Options None
    Require all granted
</Directory>

# Path to cgit binary
# Next line changed
ScriptAlias / /usr/libexec/cgit/cgi-bin/cgit/
<Directory "/usr/libexec/cgit/cgi-bin">
    AllowOverride None
    Options None
    Require all granted
</Directory>
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Configuring CGit

Now to configure cgit itself, we need to create a file called cgitrc. Order matters in the declarations, and from what I can gather you should have your scan-path near the end of the file.

To enable cloning and have it discoverable:

enable-http-clone=1
clone-prefix=https://URL/TO/WEBSITE
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

To download snapsots of the references

snapshots=tar.gz zip
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

To enable the git config to override the owner and description fields

enable-git-config=1
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Cache up to 1000 output entries

cache-size=1000
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Root Page configuration

root-title=Brandon Rozek's Repositories
root-desc=
repository-sort=age

# Start all URLs from the root directory
virtual-root=/
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Server the appropriate mime-types of certain files

mimetype.gif=image/gif
mimetype.html=text/html
mimetype.jpg=image/jpeg
mimetype.jpeg=image/jpeg
mimetype.pdf=application/pdf
mimetype.png=image/png
mimetype.svg=image/svg+xml
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Styles for the website

css=/cgit-data/cgit.css
logo=/cgit-data/cgit.png
favicon=/cgit-data/favicon.ico
source-filter=/usr/libexec/cgit/filters/syntax-highlighting.sh
about-filter=/usr/libexec/cgit/filters/about-formatting.sh
readme=:README.md
readme=:README
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Where to find the repositories

scan-path=/var/www/cgit/
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Setting up the container

I prefer using docker-compose to help manage all my containers. The first two volumes map the configuration files we created and the last volume holds our repositories.

cgit:
  image: docker.io/clearlinux/cgit
  container_name: cgit
  hostname: cgit
  volumes:
    - /etc/cgitrc:/etc/cgitrc
    - /etc/httpd-cgit.conf:/etc/httpd/conf.d/httpd-cgit.conf
    - /var/www/cgit:/var/www/cgit
  restart: always
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Populating it with Repositories

Within /var/www/cgit, start cloning your repositories:

git clone --bare REPO_URL
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

If you enabled gitinfo then for each repository you can run git config -e and add the following

[gitweb]
    owner = Name <Email>
    description = Insert your project description here
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Aside: Reverse Proxy

In my setup, I have an nginx container that handles all of the traffic. Therefore, I don’t have users enter to the cgit container directly. I handle this by adding the following reverse proxy configuration.

server {
    listen 80;
    listen [::]:80;
    server_name GIT.SERVER.URL

    location / {
        return 301 https://$host$request_uri;
    }
}

server {
    listen 443 ssl http2;
    listen [::]:443 ssl http2;
    server_name GIT.SERVER.URL;

    ssl_certificate /path/to/chain;
    ssl_certificate_key /path/to/private/key;
    include /etc/letsencrypt/options-ssl-nginx.conf;
    ssl_dhparam /etc/letsencrypt/ssl-dhparams.pem;

    location / {
        proxy_pass http://cgit;
        proxy_set_header Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Host $server_name;
        # Needed to get around HTTP2 Streaming Errors
        proxy_hide_header Upgrade;
    }
}
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Conclusion

After all the configuration, you should be able to pull it up using docker-compose.

docker-compose up cgit
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

References

These references talked about setting up cgit outside of docker, but they helped me understand the various configuration files needed.

Top comments (0)

Read next

harshalranjhani profile image

Git commands you need to know!

Harshal Ranjhani -

yanpi profile image

How to use Semantic commits properly

Yan Fernandes -

jameson profile image

Pre-push Hooks

Jameson -

andrepolischuk profile image

Helpful git commands

Andrey Polischuk -