[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":792},["ShallowReactive",2],{"/en-us/blog/open-sourcing-the-gitter-mobile-apps":3,"navigation-en-us":40,"banner-en-us":439,"footer-en-us":449,"blog-post-authors-en-us-Eric Eastwood":690,"blog-related-posts-en-us-open-sourcing-the-gitter-mobile-apps":704,"assessment-promotions-en-us":743,"next-steps-en-us":782},{"id":4,"title":5,"authorSlugs":6,"body":8,"categorySlug":9,"config":10,"content":14,"description":8,"extension":27,"isFeatured":12,"meta":28,"navigation":29,"path":30,"publishedDate":20,"seo":31,"stem":35,"tagSlugs":36,"__hash__":39},"blogPosts/en-us/blog/open-sourcing-the-gitter-mobile-apps.yml","Open Sourcing The Gitter Mobile Apps",[7],"eric-eastwood",null,"engineering",{"slug":11,"featured":12,"template":13},"open-sourcing-the-gitter-mobile-apps",false,"BlogPost",{"title":15,"description":16,"authors":17,"heroImage":19,"date":20,"body":21,"category":9,"tags":22},"Open-sourcing the Gitter mobile apps","Learn how we open sourced the Android and iOS Gitter apps.",[18],"Eric Eastwood","https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1749666717/Blog/Hero%20Images/cover-image.jpg","2019-11-22","Before we acquired Gitter most every part of Gitter was private/closed-source. The main [webapp](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/webapp) was open-sourced in June 2017 and got both mobile [Android](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/gitter-android-app)/[iOS](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/gitter-ios-app) apps open sourced in September 2018. If you would like to come help out, feel free to send us a merge request! This blog post will go over some the technical details of making the projects available for anyone to contribute.\n\nHere is the basic overview:\n\n1.  Find secrets in the current state of the project (don't worry about the commit history) and move to some config that isn't tracked in the repo.\n1.  Find/remove secrets throughout the whole repo commit history.\n1.  Make the project public 🎉\n1.  Caveats:\n    - Because we are rewriting the git history, I don't know of a way to keep merge requests/pull requests because the MRs reference the old commit hashes.\n\nQuick navigation:\n\n- [Jump to open sourcing Android](#android)\n- [Jump to open sourcing iOS](#ios)\n\n## Android\n\nIf you want to check out the full project and final result, you can check out the [project on GitLab](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/gitter-android-app) ([open-sourced 2018-8-8](https://twitter.com/gitchat/status/1027293167471812611)).\n\nTo start out, we used the [GitHub to GitLab project import](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/user/project/import/github.html) to move the private GitHub project over to GitLab. We named it `gitter-android-app2` so that later on we could create the actual clean public project without any of the orphaned git references that may potentially leak.\n\n### Finding secrets\n\n[`truffleHog`](https://github.com/dxa4481/truffleHog) will search for high entropy strings (like tokens/passwords) through the entire git repo history. It's also useful to find all the potential areas where secrets may still exist in the current state of the project. Some sticky points we encountered while using include:\n\n- \"I wish we could just search the current state of the project instead of all git history (the `--max_depth=2` argument will just make it search the diff of the latest commit)\" [dxa4481/truffleHog#92](https://github.com/dxa4481/truffleHog/issues/92).\n- \"The output will show the entire diff for the triggered commit which is a bit burdensome to see exactly what is wrong. The JSON output `--json` is sometimes easier to understand\" [https://github.com/dxa4481/truffleHog/issues/58](https://github.com/dxa4481/truffleHog/issues/58) or [dxa4481/truffleHog#102](https://github.com/dxa4481/truffleHog/issues/102).\n\n### Moving secrets to untracked config\n\nOnce we figure out where all of the secrets are we need a config/variable solution that isn't tracked by git but still lets them be available when building. We also wanted the solution to work in GitLab CI for some sanity builds/testing. There are lots of good articles on this topic:\n\n- [Remove private signing information from your project](https://developer.android.com/studio/build/gradle-tips#remove-private-signing-information-from-your-project)\n- [Keeping Your Android Project’s Secrets Secret](https://medium.com/@geocohn/keeping-your-android-projects-secrets-secret-393b8855765d)\n- [Hiding Secrets in Android Apps](https://rammic.github.io/2015/07/28/hiding-secrets-in-android-apps/)\n- [Keeping secrets in an Android Application](https://joshmcarthur.com/2014/02/16/keeping-secrets-in-an-android-application.html)\n- [Android: Loading API Keys and other secrets from properties file using gradle](https://gist.github.com/curioustechizen/9f7d745f9f5f51355bd6)\n- [How can I keep API keys out of source control?](https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/12/how-can-i-keep-api-keys-out-of-source-control/)\n\nOur solution is completely based on the information in these articles. We chose to go the route of defining things in a `secrets.properties` file which can easily be read in the Gradle build script which handles the build even when using Android Studio. If the `secrets.properties` file doesn't exist (like in CI), it will try to read the secrets from [environment variables which can easily be supplied in the project settings](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/ci/variables/).\n\n`secerts.properties`\n\n```properties\n# Visit https://developer.gitter.im/apps (sign in) and create a new app\n# Name: my-gitter-android-app (can be anything)\n# Redirect URL: https://gitter.im/login/oauth/callback\noauth_client_id=\"...\"\noauth_client_secret=\"...\"\noauth_redirect_uri=\"https://gitter.im/login/oauth/callback\"\n```\n\n`build.gradle`\n\n```text\napply plugin: 'com.android.application'\n\n// Try reading secrets from file\ndef secretsPropertiesFile = rootProject.file(\"secrets.properties\")\ndef secretProperties = new Properties()\nif (secretsPropertiesFile.exists()) {\n    secretProperties.load(new FileInputStream(secretsPropertiesFile))\n}\n// Otherwise read from environment variables, this happens in CI\nelse {\n    secretProperties.setProperty(\"oauth_client_id\", \"\\\"${System.getenv('oauth_client_id')}\\\"\")\n    secretProperties.setProperty(\"oauth_client_secret\", \"\\\"${System.getenv('oauth_client_secret')}\\\"\")\n    secretProperties.setProperty(\"oauth_redirect_uri\", \"\\\"${System.getenv('oauth_redirect_uri')}\\\"\")\n}\n\nandroid {\n    ...\n\n    defaultConfig {\n        ...\n\n        buildConfigField(\"String\", \"oauth_client_id\", \"${secretProperties['oauth_client_id']}\")\n        buildConfigField(\"String\", \"oauth_client_secret\", \"${secretProperties['oauth_client_secret']}\")\n        buildConfigField(\"String\", \"oauth_redirect_uri\", \"${secretProperties['oauth_redirect_uri']}\")\n    }\n    ...\n}\n```\n\nUse the config variables in the Java app:\n\n```java\nimport im.gitter.gitter.BuildConfig;\n\nBuildConfig.oauth_client_id;\nBuildConfig.oauth_client_secret;\nBuildConfig.oauth_redirect_uri;\n```\n\n#### Removing compiled assets\n\nWe use a `WebView` to display the HTML markdown messages in the chat room. This view uses assets built from the main [`webapp` project](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/webapp). Because these assets had some inlined production [`webapp`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/webapp) secrets that whole directory needed to be removed.\n\nInitially, we opted to have the developer build these assets with their own secrets and symlink the build output directory. The [community made this even simpler](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/gitter-android-app/merge_requests/113), so now there is just a Gradle task to run which fetches the latest build we have available from the `webapp` GitLab CI.\n\n### Removing secrets from the repo history\n\nFrom your `truffleHog` results earlier, you should know where secrets were stored throughout the history. We can use [BFG Repo-Cleaner](https://rtyley.github.io/bfg-repo-cleaner/) to remove and rewrite the repo history quickly.\n\nWhen using BFG, I wanted just to rewrite all of the sensitive values in `app/src/main/res/values/settings.xml` instead of completely removing them, but rewriting isn't an option with BFG so I went ahead with deleting it and recreated it in a commit afterwards. 🤷\n\nFor the Android app, here are the BFG commands I used,\n\n- Remove `app/src/main/assets/www/`\n  - `java -jar \"bfg.jar\" --delete-folders www`\n- Remove `app/src/main/res/values/settings.xml`\n  - `java -jar \"bfg.jar\" --delete-files settings.xml`\n- Remove sensitive strings where we can't just remove the whole file (collected from `truffleHog` results)\n  - `java -jar \"bfg.jar\" --replace-text \"gitter-android-bad-words.txt\"`\n\nAfter you think you removed all the secrets, it's best to run `truffleHog` again just to make sure no secrets are leftover. 😉\n\n### Make it public\n\nNow it's time to update your `readme` with some setup instruction so the community knows how to contribute.\n\nThis is the scary part 😅. Go to **Project settings** > **General** > **Permissions** > set **Project visibility** as **Public**. You can [read more about project access here](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/public_access/public_access.html).\n\nCurious about how to setup builds in GitLab CI? [Learn more from this blog post](/blog/setting-up-gitlab-ci-for-android-projects/), which was what we used to set it up for our projects.\n\nYou can even learn how we [automated the release process so we can publish straight to the Google Play Store from GitLab CI via fastlane 🚀](/blog/android-publishing-with-gitlab-and-fastlane/).\n\n## iOS\n\nIf you want to see the full project and final result, you can check out the [project on GitLab](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/gitter-ios-app) ([open-sourced 2018-9-18](https://twitter.com/gitchat/status/1041795909103898625)).\n\nThe same concepts apply from the Android section. We create a separate private project, `gitter-ios-app2`, where we can work and later on, we can create the actual clean public project(`gitter-ios-app`) without any of the orphaned git references that could leak.\n\n### Finding secrets\n\n`truffleHog` didn't work well in the iOS project because there was a bunch of generated XCode files that had file hashes (high entropy strings which truffleHog looks for) – which meant every commit was listed. 🤦‍ Instead of trying to find something to filter the results down or get another tool, I decided just search manually. Here is the list of things we looked for:\n\n- `token`\n- `secret`\n- `key`\n- `cert`\n- `api`\n- `pw`\n- `password`\n\nI used this directory filter when `Ctrl + f` those strings above to avoid finding things outside of the repo itself (copy-paste for Atom editor): `!Common/,!Libraries,!Gitter/www,!Pods/,!xctool`\n\n### Moving secrets to untracked config\n\nThe iOS app uses a few git sub-modules which we also had to check for secrets before making them public. It turned out only one of the sub-modules – [`troupeobjccommon`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/troupeobjccommon) – had secrets of it's own so I ran through the same secret removal process.\n\nWe had the same OAuth secrets in the main part of the iOS app, but since `troupeobjccommon` was also trying to handle OAuth secret settings, we opted for putting the new logic in `troupeobjccommon` to avoid having to refactor whatever other downstream code that uses the same submodule (like the macOS desktop app).\n\nHere are some articles around handling secrets in an iOS project,\n\n- [Secret variables in Xcode AND your CI for fun and profit 💌](https://medium.com/flawless-app-stories/secret-variables-in-xcode-and-your-ci-for-fun-and-profit-d387a50475d7)\n- [Secrets Management in iOS Applications](https://medium.com/@jules2689/secrets-management-in-ios-applications-52795c254ec1)\n\nSince iOS apps can only be built on macOS and we don't have any macOS GitLab CI runners, our solution doesn't have to be CI compatible. You can track [this issue for shared macOS GitLab CI runners](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/gl-infra/infrastructure/issues/5720).\n\n`Gitter/GitterSecrets-Dev.plist`\n\n```xml\n\u003C?xml version=\"1.0\" encoding=\"UTF-8\"?>\n\u003C!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC \"-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN\" \"http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd\">\n\u003Cplist version=\"1.0\">\n\u003Cdict>\n  \u003C!--\n  Visit https://developer.gitter.im/apps (sign in) and create a new app\n  Name: my-gitter-ios-app (can be anything)\n  Redirect URL: https://gitter.im/login/oauth/callback\n  -->\n  \u003Ckey>OAuthClientId\u003C/key>\n  \u003Cstring>\u003C/string>\n  \u003Ckey>OAuthClientSecret\u003C/key>\n  \u003Cstring>\u003C/string>\n  \u003Ckey>OAuthCallback\u003C/key>\n  \u003Cstring>https://gitter.im/login/oauth/callback\u003C/string>\n\u003C/dict>\n\u003C/plist>\n```\n\n[`troupeobjccommon`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/troupeobjccommon) is in Objective-C\n\n`TRAppSettings.h`\n\n```text\n#import \u003CFoundation/Foundation.h>\n\n@interface TRAppSettings : NSObject\n\n+ (TRAppSettings *) sharedInstance;\n\n- (NSString *) clientID;\n\n- (NSString *) clientSecret;\n\n- (NSString *) oauthScope;\n\n@end\n```\n\n`TRAppSettings.m`\n\n```objc\n@interface TRAppSettings ()\n\n@property (strong, nonatomic) NSUserDefaults *secrets;\n\n@end\n\nstatic TRAppSettings *sharedAppSettingsSingleton;\n\n@implementation TRAppSettings {\n    int firstRunPostUpdate;\n}\n\n+ (void)initialize\n{\n    static BOOL initialized = NO;\n    if(!initialized)\n    {\n        initialized = YES;\n        sharedAppSettingsSingleton = [[TRAppSettings alloc] init];\n    }\n\n    NSLog(@\"Pulling secrets from SECRETS_PLIST = %@.plist\", SECRETS_PLIST);\n}\n\n+ (TRAppSettings *) sharedInstance\n{\n    return sharedAppSettingsSingleton;\n}\n\n- (id)init {\n    NSString *troupeSecretsPath = [[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:\"GitterSecrets-Dev\" ofType:@\"plist\"];\n    if(troupeSecretsPath == nil) {\n        NSString *failureReason = [NSString stringWithFormat:@\"Gitter secrets file not found in bundle: %@.plist. You probably need to add it to the `Gitter/Supporting Files` in Xcode navigator\", SECRETS_PLIST];\n        NSException* exception = [NSException\n            exceptionWithName:@\"FileNotFoundException\"\n            reason:failureReason\n            userInfo:nil];\n\n        NSLog(@\"%@\", failureReason);\n\n        [exception raise];\n    }\n    NSDictionary *troupeSecrets = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithContentsOfFile:troupeSecretsPath];\n\n    self.secrets = [NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults];\n    [self.secrets registerDefaults:troupeSecrets];\n}\n\n- (NSString *) clientID {\n    return [self.secrets stringForKey:@\"OAuthClientId\"];\n}\n\n- (NSString *) clientSecret {\n    return [self.secrets stringForKey:@\"OAuthClientSecret\"];\n}\n\n- (NSString *)oauthScope {\n    return [self.secrets stringForKey:@\"OAuthCallback\"];\n}\n```\n\nUsage in the Swift app:\n\n```swift\nprivate let appSettings = TRAppSettings.sharedInstance()\n\nappSettings!.clientID()\nappSettings!.clientSecret()\nappSettings!.oauthScope()\n```\n\n### Adding in GitLab CI\n\nIf you're interested in setting up automated builds and publish releases to the Apple App Store from GitLab CI, you can learn how [blog post about using fastlane](/blog/ios-publishing-with-gitlab-and-fastlane/).\n\n### Removing secrets from the repo history\n\nWe didn't have a complete picture of what to remove because `truffleHog` didn't work well, so we didn't use BFG Repo-Cleaner. To remove secrets from the git repo history, we just squashed all of the history into a single commit.\n\n## Life after open sourcing apps\n\nWe have some [thoughts of deprecating the Android/iOS apps](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/webapp/issues/2281) but the community has been great to keep the apps alive so far. We released a couple versions of each app including [dark theme](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/gitter-android-app/merge_requests/2) and [GitLab sign-in](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/gitter-android-app/merge_requests/112) for Android and a bunch of technical debt and fixes for iOS, including removing the deprecated [`SlackTextViewController`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/gitter-ios-app/merge_requests/8) (and we are intensely working on incorporating the new [`SlackWysiwygInputController`](https://goo.gl/7NDM3x) 😜).\n\nThe [Android](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/gitter-android-app)/[iOS](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitter/gitter-ios-app) apps could benefit from a lot of polish and fixes, so if you see anything particularly annoying, we would love to review and merge your updates!\n\nCover image by [Nate Johnston](https://unsplash.com/@natejohnston) on [Unsplash](https://unsplash.com/photos/DkCydKeaLV8).\n",[23,24,25,26],"open 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statement",{"items":680},[681,684,687],{"text":682,"config":683},"Terms",{"href":509,"dataGaName":510,"dataGaLocation":457},{"text":685,"config":686},"Cookies",{"dataGaName":519,"dataGaLocation":457,"id":520,"isOneTrustButton":29},{"text":688,"config":689},"Privacy",{"href":514,"dataGaName":515,"dataGaLocation":457},[691],{"id":692,"title":18,"body":8,"config":693,"content":695,"description":8,"extension":27,"meta":699,"navigation":29,"path":700,"seo":701,"stem":702,"__hash__":703},"blogAuthors/en-us/blog/authors/eric-eastwood.yml",{"template":694},"BlogAuthor",{"name":18,"config":696},{"headshot":697,"ctfId":698},"","MadLittleMods",{},"/en-us/blog/authors/eric-eastwood",{},"en-us/blog/authors/eric-eastwood","3GY5NqxW7tQ8UAQZ6F5lUcRr_K1vdp-6xP1nVi6jI4I",[705,720,732],{"content":706,"config":718},{"title":707,"description":708,"authors":709,"heroImage":711,"date":712,"body":713,"category":9,"tags":714},"How to use GitLab Container Virtual Registry with Docker Hardened Images","Learn how to simplify container image management with this step-by-step guide.",[710],"Tim Rizzi","https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1772111172/mwhgbjawn62kymfwrhle.png","2026-03-12","If you're a platform engineer, you've probably had this conversation:\n  \n*\"Security says we need to use hardened base images.\"*\n\n*\"Great, where do I configure credentials for yet another registry?\"*\n\n*\"Also, how do we make sure everyone actually uses them?\"*\n\nOr this one:\n\n*\"Why are our builds so slow?\"*\n\n*\"We're pulling the same 500MB image from Docker Hub in every single job.\"*\n\n*\"Can't we just cache these somewhere?\"*\n\nI've been working on [Container Virtual Registry](https://docs.gitlab.com/user/packages/virtual_registry/container/) at GitLab specifically to solve these problems. It's a pull-through cache that sits in front of your upstream registries — Docker Hub, dhi.io (Docker Hardened Images), MCR, and Quay — and gives your teams a single endpoint to pull from. Images get cached on the first pull. Subsequent pulls come from the cache. Your developers don't need to know or care which upstream a particular image came from.\n\nThis article shows you how to set up Container Virtual Registry, specifically with Docker Hardened Images in mind, since that's a combination that makes a lot of sense for teams concerned about security and not making their developers' lives harder.\n\n## What problem are we actually solving?\n\nThe Platform teams I usually talk to manage container images across three to five registries:\n\n* **Docker Hub** for most base images\n* **dhi.io** for Docker Hardened Images (security-conscious workloads)\n* **MCR** for .NET and Azure tooling\n* **Quay.io** for Red Hat ecosystem stuff\n* **Internal registries** for proprietary images\n\nEach one has its own:\n\n* Authentication mechanism\n* Network latency characteristics\n* Way of organizing image paths\n\nYour CI/CD configs end up littered with registry-specific logic. Credential management becomes a project unto itself. And every pipeline job pulls the same base images over the network, even though they haven't changed in weeks.\n\nContainer Virtual Registry consolidates this. One registry URL. One authentication flow (GitLab's). Cached images are served from GitLab's infrastructure rather than traversing the internet each time.\n\n## How it works\n\nThe model is straightforward:\n\n```text\nYour pipeline pulls:\n  gitlab.com/virtual_registries/container/1000016/python:3.13\n\nVirtual registry checks:\n  1. Do I have this cached? → Return it\n  2. No? → Fetch from upstream, cache it, return it\n\n```\n\nYou configure upstreams in priority order. When a pull request comes in, the virtual registry checks each upstream until it finds the image. The result gets cached for a configurable period (default 24 hours).\n\n```text\n┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐\n│                    CI/CD Pipeline                       │\n│                          │                              │\n│                          ▼                              │\n│   gitlab.com/virtual_registries/container/\u003Cid>/image   │\n└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘\n                           │\n                           ▼\n┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐\n│            Container Virtual Registry                   │\n│                                                         │\n│  Upstream 1: Docker Hub ────────────────┐               │\n│  Upstream 2: dhi.io (Hardened) ────────┐│               │\n│  Upstream 3: MCR ─────────────────────┐││               │\n│  Upstream 4: Quay.io ────────────────┐│││               │\n│                                      ││││               │\n│                    ┌─────────────────┴┴┴┴──┐            │\n│                    │        Cache          │            │\n│                    │  (manifests + layers) │            │\n│                    └───────────────────────┘            │\n└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘\n```\n\n## Why this matters for Docker Hardened Images\n\n[Docker Hardened Images](https://docs.docker.com/dhi/) are great because of the minimal attack surface, near-zero CVEs, proper software bills of materials (SBOMs), and SLSA provenance. If you're evaluating base images for security-sensitive workloads, they should be on your list.\n\nBut adopting them creates the same operational friction as any new registry:\n\n* **Credential distribution**: You need to get Docker credentials to every system that pulls images from dhi.io.\n* **CI/CD changes**: Every pipeline needs to be updated to authenticate with dhi.io.\n* **Developer friction**: People need to remember to use the hardened variants.\n* **Visibility gap**: It's difficulat to tell if teams are actually using hardened images vs. regular ones.\n\nVirtual registry addresses each of these:\n\n**Single credential**: Teams authenticate to GitLab. The virtual registry handles upstream authentication. You configure Docker credentials once, at the registry level, and they apply to all pulls.\n\n**No CI/CD changes per-team**: Point pipelines at your virtual registry. Done. The upstream configuration is centralized.\n\n**Gradual adoption**: Since images get cached with their full path, you can see in the cache what's being pulled. If someone's pulling `library/python:3.11` instead of the hardened variant, you'll know.\n\n**Audit trail**: The cache shows you exactly which images are in active use. Useful for compliance, useful for understanding what your fleet actually depends on.\n\n## Setting it up\n\nHere's a real setup using the Python client from this demo project.\n\n### Create the virtual registry\n\n```python\nfrom virtual_registry_client import VirtualRegistryClient\n\nclient = VirtualRegistryClient()\n\nregistry = client.create_virtual_registry(\n    group_id=\"785414\",  # Your top-level group ID\n    name=\"platform-images\",\n    description=\"Cached container images for platform teams\"\n)\n\nprint(f\"Registry ID: {registry['id']}\")\n# You'll need this ID for the pull URL\n```\n\n### Add Docker Hub as an upstream\n\nFor official images like Alpine, Python, etc.:\n\n```python\ndocker_upstream = client.create_upstream(\n    registry_id=registry['id'],\n    url=\"https://registry-1.docker.io\",\n    name=\"Docker Hub\",\n    cache_validity_hours=24\n)\n```\n\n### Add Docker Hardened Images (dhi.io)\n\nDocker Hardened Images are hosted on `dhi.io`, a separate registry that requires authentication:\n\n```python\ndhi_upstream = client.create_upstream(\n    registry_id=registry['id'],\n    url=\"https://dhi.io\",\n    name=\"Docker Hardened Images\",\n    username=\"your-docker-username\",\n    password=\"your-docker-access-token\",\n    cache_validity_hours=24\n)\n```\n\n### Add other upstreams\n\n```python\n# MCR for .NET teams\nclient.create_upstream(\n    registry_id=registry['id'],\n    url=\"https://mcr.microsoft.com\",\n    name=\"Microsoft Container Registry\",\n    cache_validity_hours=48\n)\n\n# Quay for Red Hat stuff\nclient.create_upstream(\n    registry_id=registry['id'],\n    url=\"https://quay.io\",\n    name=\"Quay.io\",\n    cache_validity_hours=24\n)\n```\n\n### Update your CI/CD\n\nHere's a `.gitlab-ci.yml` that pulls through the virtual registry:\n\n```yaml\nvariables:\n  VIRTUAL_REGISTRY_ID: \u003Cyour_virtual_registry_ID>\n\n  \nbuild:\n  image: docker:24\n  services:\n    - docker:24-dind\n  before_script:\n    # Authenticate to GitLab (which handles upstream auth for you)\n    - echo \"${CI_JOB_TOKEN}\" | docker login -u gitlab-ci-token --password-stdin gitlab.com\n  script:\n    # All of these go through your single virtual registry\n    \n    # Official Docker Hub images (use library/ prefix)\n    - docker pull gitlab.com/virtual_registries/container/${VIRTUAL_REGISTRY_ID}/library/alpine:latest\n    \n    # Docker Hardened Images from dhi.io (no prefix needed)\n    - docker pull gitlab.com/virtual_registries/container/${VIRTUAL_REGISTRY_ID}/python:3.13\n    \n    # .NET from MCR\n    - docker pull gitlab.com/virtual_registries/container/${VIRTUAL_REGISTRY_ID}/dotnet/sdk:8.0\n```\n\n### Image path formats\n\nDifferent registries use different path conventions:\n\n| Registry | Pull URL Example |\n|----------|------------------|\n| Docker Hub (official) | `.../library/python:3.11-slim` |\n| Docker Hardened Images (dhi.io) | `.../python:3.13` |\n| MCR | `.../dotnet/sdk:8.0` |\n| Quay.io | `.../prometheus/prometheus:latest` |\n\n### Verify it's working\n\nAfter some pulls, check your cache:\n\n```python\nupstreams = client.list_registry_upstreams(registry['id'])\nfor upstream in upstreams:\n    entries = client.list_cache_entries(upstream['id'])\n    print(f\"{upstream['name']}: {len(entries)} cached entries\")\n\n```\n\n## What the numbers look like\n\nI ran tests pulling images through the virtual registry:\n\n| Metric | Without Cache | With Warm Cache |\n|--------|---------------|-----------------|\n| Pull time (Alpine) | 10.3s | 4.2s |\n| Pull time (Python 3.13 DHI) | 11.6s | ~4s |\n| Network roundtrips to upstream | Every pull | Cache misses only |\n\n\n\n\nThe first pull is the same speed (it has to fetch from upstream). Every pull after that, for the cache validity period, comes straight from GitLab's storage. No network hop to Docker Hub, dhi.io, MCR, or wherever the image lives.\n\nFor a team running hundreds of pipeline jobs per day, that's hours of cumulative build time saved.\n\n## Practical considerations\nHere are some considerations to keep in mind:\n\n### Cache validity\n\n24 hours is the default. For security-sensitive images where you want patches quickly, consider 12 hours or less:\n\n```python\nclient.create_upstream(\n    registry_id=registry['id'],\n    url=\"https://dhi.io\",\n    name=\"Docker Hardened Images\",\n    username=\"your-username\",\n    password=\"your-token\",\n    cache_validity_hours=12\n)\n```\n\nFor stable, infrequently-updated images (like specific version tags), longer validity is fine.\n\n### Upstream priority\n\nUpstreams are checked in order. If you have images with the same name on different registries, the first matching upstream wins.\n\n### Limits\n\n* Maximum of 20 virtual registries per group\n* Maximum of 20 upstreams per virtual registry\n\n## Configuration via UI\n\nYou can also configure virtual registries and upstreams directly from the GitLab UI—no API calls required. Navigate to your group's **Settings > Packages and registries > Virtual Registry** to:\n\n* Create and manage virtual registries\n* Add, edit, and reorder upstream registries\n* View and manage the cache\n* Monitor which images are being pulled\n\n## What's next\n\nWe're actively developing:\n\n* **Allow/deny lists**: Use regex to control which images can be pulled from specific upstreams.\n\nThis is beta software. It works, people are using it in production, but we're still iterating based on feedback.\n\n## Share your feedback\n\nIf you're a platform engineer dealing with container registry sprawl, I'd like to understand your setup:\n\n* How many upstream registries are you managing?\n* What's your biggest pain point with the current state?\n* Would something like this help, and if not, what's missing?\n\nPlease share your experiences in the [Container Virtual Registry feedback issue](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/work_items/589630).\n## Related resources\n- [New GitLab metrics and registry features help reduce CI/CD bottlenecks](https://about.gitlab.com/blog/new-gitlab-metrics-and-registry-features-help-reduce-ci-cd-bottlenecks/#container-virtual-registry)\n- [Container Virtual Registry documentation](https://docs.gitlab.com/user/packages/virtual_registry/container/)\n- [Container Virtual Registry API](https://docs.gitlab.com/api/container_virtual_registries/)",[715,716,717],"tutorial","product","features",{"featured":12,"template":13,"slug":719},"using-gitlab-container-virtual-registry-with-docker-hardened-images",{"content":721,"config":730},{"title":722,"description":723,"authors":724,"heroImage":726,"date":727,"category":9,"tags":728,"body":729},"How IIT Bombay students are coding the future with GitLab","At GitLab, we often talk about how software accelerates innovation. But sometimes, you have to step away from the Zoom calls and stand in a crowded university hall to remember why we do this.",[725],"Nick Veenhof","https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1750099013/Blog/Hero%20Images/Blog/Hero%20Images/blog-image-template-1800x945%20%2814%29_6VTUA8mUhOZNDaRVNPeKwl_1750099012960.png","2026-01-08",[261,612,23],"The GitLab team recently had the privilege of judging the **iHack Hackathon** at **IIT Bombay's E-Summit**. The energy was electric, the coffee was flowing, and the talent was undeniable. But what struck us most wasn't just the code — it was the sheer determination of students to solve real-world problems, often overcoming significant logistical and financial hurdles to simply be in the room.\n\n\nThrough our [GitLab for Education program](https://about.gitlab.com/solutions/education/), we aim to empower the next generation of developers with tools and opportunity. Here is a look at what the students built, and how they used GitLab to bridge the gap between idea and reality.\n\n## The challenge: Build faster, build securely\n\nThe premise for the GitLab track of the hackathon was simple: Don't just show us a product; show us how you built it. We wanted to see how students utilized GitLab's platform — from Issue Boards to CI/CD pipelines — to accelerate the development lifecycle.\n\nThe results were inspiring.\n\n## The winners\n\n### 1st place: Team Decode — Democratizing Scientific Research\n\n**Project:** FIRE (Fast Integrated Research Environment)\n\nTeam Decode took home the top prize with a solution that warms a developer's heart: a local-first, blazing-fast data processing tool built with [Rust](https://about.gitlab.com/blog/secure-rust-development-with-gitlab/) and Tauri. They identified a massive pain point for data science students: existing tools are fragmented, slow, and expensive.\n\nTheir solution, FIRE, allows researchers to visualize complex formats (like NetCDF) instantly. What impressed the judges most was their \"hacker\" ethos. They didn't just build a tool; they built it to be open and accessible.\n\n**How they used GitLab:** Since the team lived far apart, asynchronous communication was key. They utilized **GitLab Issue Boards** and **Milestones** to track progress and integrated their repo with Telegram to get real-time push notifications. As one team member noted, \"Coordinating all these technologies was really difficult, and what helped us was GitLab... the Issue Board really helped us track who was doing what.\"\n\n![Team Decode](https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1767380253/epqazj1jc5c7zkgqun9h.jpg)\n\n### 2nd place: Team BichdeHueDost — Reuniting to Solve Payments\n\n**Project:** SemiPay (RFID Cashless Payment for Schools)\n\nThe team name, BichdeHueDost, translates to \"Friends who have been set apart.\" It's a fitting name for a group of friends who went to different colleges but reunited to build this project. They tackled a unique problem: handling cash in schools for young children. Their solution used RFID cards backed by a blockchain ledger to ensure secure, cashless transactions for students.\n\n**How they used GitLab:** They utilized [GitLab CI/CD](https://about.gitlab.com/topics/ci-cd/) to automate the build process for their Flutter application (APK), ensuring that every commit resulted in a testable artifact. This allowed them to iterate quickly despite the \"flaky\" nature of cross-platform mobile development.\n\n![Team BichdeHueDost](https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1767380253/pkukrjgx2miukb6nrj5g.jpg)\n\n### 3rd place: Team ZenYukti — Agentic Repository Intelligence\n\n**Project:** RepoInsight AI (AI-powered, GitLab-native intelligence platform)\n\nTeam ZenYukti impressed us with a solution that tackles a universal developer pain point: understanding unfamiliar codebases. What stood out to the judges was the tool's practical approach to onboarding and code comprehension: RepoInsight-AI automatically generates documentation, visualizes repository structure, and even helps identify bugs, all while maintaining context about the entire codebase.\n\n**How they used GitLab:** The team built a comprehensive CI/CD pipeline that showcased GitLab's security and DevOps capabilities. They integrated [GitLab's Security Templates](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/tree/master/lib/gitlab/ci/templates/Security) (SAST, Dependency Scanning, and Secret Detection), and utilized [GitLab Container Registry](https://docs.gitlab.com/user/packages/container_registry/) to manage their Docker images for backend and frontend components. They created an AI auto-review bot that runs on merge requests, demonstrating an \"agentic workflow\" where AI assists in the development process itself.\n\n![Team ZenYukti](https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1767380253/ymlzqoruv5al1secatba.jpg)\n\n## Beyond the code: A lesson in inclusion\n\nWhile the code was impressive, the most powerful moment of the event happened away from the keyboard.\n\nDuring the feedback session, we learned about the journey Team ZenYukti took to get to Mumbai. They traveled over 24 hours, covering nearly 1,800 kilometers. Because flights were too expensive and trains were booked, they traveled in the \"General Coach,\" a non-reserved, severely overcrowded carriage.\n\nAs one student described it:\n\n*\"You cannot even imagine something like this... there are no seats... people sit on the top of the train. This is what we have endured.\"*\n\nThis hit home. [Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging](https://handbook.gitlab.com/handbook/company/culture/inclusion/) are core values at GitLab. We realized that for these students, the barrier to entry wasn't intellect or skill, it was access.\n\nIn that moment, we decided to break that barrier. We committed to reimbursing the travel expenses for the participants who struggled to get there. It's a small step, but it underlines a massive truth: **talent is distributed equally, but opportunity is not.**\n\n![hackathon class together](https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1767380252/o5aqmboquz8ehusxvgom.jpg)\n\n### The future is bright (and automated)\n\nWe also saw incredible potential in teams like Prometheus, who attempted to build an autonomous patch remediation tool (DevGuardian), and Team Arrakis, who built a voice-first job portal for blue-collar workers using [GitLab Duo](https://about.gitlab.com/gitlab-duo/) to troubleshoot their pipelines.\n\nTo all the students who participated: You are the future. Through [GitLab for Education](https://about.gitlab.com/solutions/education/), we are committed to providing you with the top-tier tools (like GitLab Ultimate) you need to learn, collaborate, and change the world — whether you are coding from a dorm room, a lab, or a train carriage. **Keep shipping.**\n\n> :bulb: Learn more about the [GitLab for Education program](https://about.gitlab.com/solutions/education/).\n",{"slug":731,"featured":12,"template":13},"how-iit-bombay-students-code-future-with-gitlab",{"content":733,"config":741},{"title":734,"description":735,"authors":736,"heroImage":737,"date":738,"category":9,"tags":739,"body":740},"Artois University elevates research and curriculum with GitLab Ultimate for Education","Artois University's CRIL leveraged the GitLab for Education program to gain free access to Ultimate, transforming advanced research and computer science curricula.",[725],"https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1750099203/Blog/Hero%20Images/Blog/Hero%20Images/blog-image-template-1800x945%20%2820%29_2bJGC5ZP3WheoqzlLT05C5_1750099203484.png","2025-12-10",[612,261,716],"Leading academic institutions face a critical challenge: how to provide thousands of students and researchers with industry-standard, **full-featured DevSecOps tools** without compromising institutional control. Many start with basic version control, but the modern curriculum demands integrated capabilities for planning, security, and advanced CI/CD.\n\nThe **GitLab for Education program** is designed to solve this by providing access to **GitLab Ultimate** for qualifying institutions, allowing them to scale their operations and elevate their academic offerings. \n\nThis article showcases a powerful success story from the **Centre de Recherche en Informatique de Lens (CRIL)**, a joint laboratory of **Artois University** and CNRS in France. After years of relying solely on GitLab Community Edition (CE), the university's move to GitLab Ultimate through the GitLab for Education program immediately unlocked advanced capabilities, transforming their teaching, research, and contribution workflows virtually overnight. This story demonstrates why GitLab Ultimate is essential for institutions seeking to deliver advanced computer science and research curricula.\n\n## GitLab Ultimate unlocked: Managing scale and driving academic value\n\n**Artois University's** self-managed GitLab instance is a large-scale operation, supporting nearly **3,000 users** across approximately **19,000 projects**, primarily serving computer science students and researchers. While GitLab Community Edition was robust, the upgrade to GitLab Ultimate provided the sophisticated tooling necessary for managing this scale and facilitating advanced university-level work.\n\n***\"We can see the difference,\" says Daniel Le Berre, head of research at CRIL and the instance maintainer. \"It's a completely different product. Each week reveals new features that directly enhance our productivity and teaching.\"***\n\nThe institution joined the GitLab for Education program specifically because it covers both **instructional and non-commercial research use cases** and offers full access to Ultimate's features, removing significant cost barriers.\n\n### Key GitLab Ultimate benefits for students and researchers\n\n* **Advanced project management at scale:** Master's students now benefit from **GitLab Ultimate's project planning features**. This enables them to structure, track, and manage complex, long-term research projects using professional methodologies like portfolio management and advanced issue tracking that seamlessly roll up across their thousands of projects.\n\n* **Enhanced visibility:** Features like improved dashboards and code previews directly in Markdown files dramatically streamline tracking and documentation review, reducing administrative friction for both instructors and students managing large project loads.\n\n## Comprehensive curriculum: From concepts to continuous delivery\n\nGitLab Ultimate is deeply integrated into the computer science curriculum, moving students beyond simple `git` commands to practical **DevSecOps implementation**.\n\n* **Git fundamentals:** Students begin by visualizing concepts using open-source tools to master Git concepts.\n\n* **Full CI/CD implementation:** Students use GitLab CI for rigorous **Test-Driven Development (TDD)** in their software projects. They learn to build, test, and perform quality assurance using unit and integration testing pipelines—core competency made seamless by the integrated platform.\n\n* **DevSecOps for research and documentation:** The university teaches students that DevSecOps principles are vital for all collaborative work. Inspired by earlier work in Delft, students manage and produce critical research documentation (PDFs from Markdown files) using GitLab, incorporating quality checks like linters and spell checks directly in the CI pipeline. This ensures high-quality, reproducible research output.\n\n* **Future-proofing security skills:** The GitLab Ultimate platform immediately positions the institution to incorporate advanced DevSecOps features like SAST and DAST scanning as their research and development code projects grow, ensuring students are prepared for industry security standards.\n\n## Accelerating open source contributions with GitLab Duo\n\nAccess to the full GitLab platform, including our AI capabilities, has empowered students to make impactful contributions to the wider open source community faster than ever before.\n\nTwo Master's students recently completed direct contributions to the GitLab product, adding the **ORCID identifier** into user profiles. Working on GitLab.com, they leveraged **GitLab Duo's AI chat and code suggestions** to navigate the codebase efficiently.\n\n***\"This would not have been possible without GitLab Duo,\" Daniel Le Berre notes. \"The AI features helped students, who might have lacked deep codebase knowledge, deliver meaningful contributions in just two weeks.\"***\n\nThis demonstrates how providing students with cutting-edge tools **accelerates their learning and impact**, allowing them to translate classroom knowledge into real-world contributions immediately.\n\n## Empowering open research and institutional control\n\nThe stability of the self-managed instance at Artois University is key to its success. This model guarantees **institutional control and stability** — a critical factor for long-term research preservation.\n\nThe institution's expertise in this area was recently highlighted in a major 2024 study led by CRIL, titled: \"[Higher Education and Research Forges in France - Definition, uses, limitations encountered and needs analysis](https://hal.science/hal-04208924v4)\" ([Project on GitLab](https://gitlab.in2p3.fr/coso-college-codes-sources-et-logiciels/forges-esr-en)). The research found that the vast majority of public forges in French Higher Education and Research relied on **GitLab**. This finding underscores the consensus among academic leaders that self-hosted solutions are essential for **data control and longevity**, especially when compared to relying on external, commercial forges.\n\n## Unlock GitLab Ultimate for your institution today\n\nThe success story of **Artois University's CRIL** proves the transformative power of the GitLab for Education program. By providing **free access to GitLab Ultimate**, we enable large-scale institutions to:\n\n1.  **Deliver a modern, integrated DevSecOps curriculum.**\n\n2.  **Support advanced, collaborative research projects with Ultimate planning features.**\n\n3.  **Empower students to make AI-assisted open source contributions.**\n\n4.  **Maintain institutional control and data longevity.**\n\nIf your academic institution is ready to equip its students and researchers with the complete DevSecOps platform and its most advanced features, we invite you to join the program.\n\nThe program provides **free access to GitLab Ultimate** for qualifying instructional and non-commercial research use cases.\n\n**Apply now [online](https://about.gitlab.com/solutions/education/join/).**\n",{"slug":742,"featured":29,"template":13},"artois-university-elevates-curriculum-with-gitlab-ultimate-for-education",{"promotions":744},[745,759,770],{"id":746,"categories":747,"header":749,"text":750,"button":751,"image":756},"ai-modernization",[748],"ai-ml","Is AI achieving its promise at scale?","Quiz will take 5 minutes or less",{"text":752,"config":753},"Get your AI maturity score",{"href":754,"dataGaName":755,"dataGaLocation":243},"/assessments/ai-modernization-assessment/","modernization assessment",{"config":757},{"src":758},"https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1772138786/qix0m7kwnd8x2fh1zq49.png",{"id":760,"categories":761,"header":762,"text":750,"button":763,"image":767},"devops-modernization",[716,558],"Are you just managing tools or shipping innovation?",{"text":764,"config":765},"Get your DevOps maturity score",{"href":766,"dataGaName":755,"dataGaLocation":243},"/assessments/devops-modernization-assessment/",{"config":768},{"src":769},"https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1772138785/eg818fmakweyuznttgid.png",{"id":771,"categories":772,"header":774,"text":750,"button":775,"image":779},"security-modernization",[773],"security","Are you trading speed for security?",{"text":776,"config":777},"Get your security maturity score",{"href":778,"dataGaName":755,"dataGaLocation":243},"/assessments/security-modernization-assessment/",{"config":780},{"src":781},"https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1772138786/p4pbqd9nnjejg5ds6mdk.png",{"header":783,"blurb":784,"button":785,"secondaryButton":790},"Start building faster today","See what your team can do with the intelligent orchestration platform for DevSecOps.\n",{"text":786,"config":787},"Get your free trial",{"href":788,"dataGaName":51,"dataGaLocation":789},"https://gitlab.com/-/trial_registrations/new?glm_content=default-saas-trial&glm_source=about.gitlab.com/","feature",{"text":495,"config":791},{"href":55,"dataGaName":56,"dataGaLocation":789},1773350821147]