Repository

A plugin repository is a place where you store your plugin binaries. This repository must be publicly available and supports downloading assets via HTTP(s). This document explains how to create Botkube plugin repositories by providing examples based on GitHub functionality. However, any static file server can be used, for instance: s3, gcs, etc.

This document describes how to set up such repository. If you use or plan to use GitHub you can adapt the template repository that has batteries included to start developing and hosting Botkube plugins right away.

Index file

Your plugin repository must contain at least one index file and one plugin binary. Depending on your needs and preferences, you can create one or more index files to categorize your plugins. You can host both the executor and source plugins in a single repository. You can also include them in the same index file.

In the index file, provide an entry for every plugin from your plugin repository. The index file must have the following syntax:

entries:
  - name: { plugin_name }
    type: { plugin_type } # executor or source
    description: { plugin_description }
    version: { plugin_version }
    urls:
      - url: { url_to_plugin_binary }
        platform:
          os: { plugin_operating_system } # darwin or linux
          architecture: { plugin_architecture } # amd64 or arm64
        dependencies: # optional dependencies
          { dependency_name }:
            url: { url_to_dependency_binary }

It is not required to host a plugin or dependency binary on the same server as the index file.

Generate index file

You can create the index file by yourself our use our tool to generate it automatically based on the directory with plugins binaries. The binaries must be named according to the following pattern:

• For executors, executor_{plugin_name}_{os}_{arch}; for example, executor_kubectl_darwin_amd64.
• For sources, source_{plugin_name}_{os}_{arch}; for example, source_kubernetes_darwin_amd64.

Steps

1. In your plugin repository, add tools.go:

   cat << EOF > tools.go
   //go:build tools
   
   package tools
   
   import (
   	 _ "github.com/kubeshop/botkube/hack"
   )
   EOF
   note

   We use the tools.go file, which is the recommended way of tracking tool dependencies.

2. Refresh dependencies:

   go mod tidy

3. Build all your plugins. See Build plugin binaries.

4. Generate an index file:

   go run github.com/kubeshop/botkube/hack -binaries-path "./dist" -url-base-path "https://example.com"
   info

   Replace the -url-base-path flag with the base path of your HTTP server. See Hosting plugins for some examples.

Host plugins

This section describes example ways for serving Botkube plugins.

GitHub releases

A GitHub release allows you to upload additional assets that are later accessible with a predictable URL. When you generate the index file, specify the -url-base-path flag as https://github.com/{owner}/{repo}/releases/download/{release_tag}, for example, https://github.com/kubeshop/botkube/releases/download/v1.0.0.

Once the plugin binaries are built and the index file is generated, you can create a GitHub release using GitHub CLI. For example:

gh release create v1.0.0 \
 ./dist/source_* \
 ./dist/executor_* \
 ./plugins-index.yaml

Automation

You can use GitHub Actions to publish Botkube plugins automatically each time a new tag is pushed. See the release workflow on the botkube-plugins-template repository for the out-of-the-box solution, which you can use and modify if needed.

GitHub pages

GitHub allows you to serve static pages via GitHub Pages. When you generate the index file, specify the -url-base-path flag as https://{user}.github.io/{repository}, for example, https://kubeshop.github.io/botkube-plugins.

Initial setup

1. Navigate to the Git repository with your plugins.

2. Create the gh-pages branch:

   git switch --orphan gh-pages
   git commit --allow-empty -m "Initialization commit"
   git push -u origin gh-pages

3. Follow this guide to make sure your gh-pages branch is set as the source for GitHub Pages.

Publishing steps

1. Clone gh-pages into /tmp/botkube-plugins:

   git clone -b gh-pages "https://github.com/{owner}/{repo}.git" /tmp/botkube-plugins

2. Move built binaries and generated index file:

   mv dist/executor_* /tmp/botkube-plugins/
   mv dist/source_* /tmp/botkube-plugins/
   mv plugins-index.yaml /tmp/botkube-plugins

3. Commit and push copied files:

   cd /tmp/botkube-plugins
   git add -A
   git commit -m "Release Botkube plugins"
   git push

4. Remove cloned gh-pages:

   cd -
   rm -rf /tmp/botkube-charts

In such setup, you can use your default branch to store your plugins code, and the gh-pages branch as a plugin repository.

Automation

You can use GitHub Actions to publish Botkube plugins automatically each time a new tag is pushed. See the pages-release workflow on the botkube-plugins-template repository for the out-of-the-box solution, which you can use and modify if needed.

Use hosted plugins

To use the plugins that you published, add your repository under plugins in the values.yaml file for a given Botkube deployment. For example:

plugins:
  repositories:
    repo-name:
      url: https://example.com/plugins-index.yaml

Once the plugin repository is added, you can refer to it in the executor or sources section.

executors:
  "plugins":
    repo-name/[email protected]: # Plugin name syntax: {repo}/{plugin}[@{version}]. If version is not provided, the latest version from repository is used.
      enabled: true
      config: {} # Plugin's specific configuration.
sources:
  "plugins":
    repo-name/[email protected]: # Plugin name syntax: {repo}/{plugin}[@{version}]. If version is not provided, the latest version from repository is used.
      enabled: true
      config: {} # Plugin's specific configuration.