---
title: Gitano Admininistration
author:
  - Lars Wirzenius <liw@liw.fi>
  - Richard Maw <richard.maw@gmail.com>
  - Daniel Silverstone <dsilvers@digital-scurf.org>
date: Gitano v1.0, Manual v0.1
...

> **NOTA BENE:** This manual is incomplete and describes the state of
> Gitano at its 1.0 release.

# Introduction

This document describes what a "Gitano admin" needs to know. Gitano
admins are reponsible for setting the policy of a Gitano installation:
who can access it, what they can do, what they can't do, and so on.
The target audience of this document is those who are members of the
`gitano-admin` group in a Gitano installation. We assume they know how
to use Gitano as a user already, and are comfortable editing plain
text files and using git to manage files.

This document is not about installing Gitano or configuring it to work on a
system.  You can find information on how to do that on the Gitano Wiki at
<https://wiki.gitano.org.uk/> or in the manual for the `gitano-setup` tool.

# Overview

Gitano admins primarily enable people to do their jobs. This involves:

* Define Gitano access control rules using Lace.
* Add and remove Gitano users.
* Helping people with their Gitano problems.
* Possibly add and remove Git repositories, unless they allow people
  to do that themselves.

Access control to Gitano is defined using a language called Lace. Lace
is a fairly simple textual language for expressing what actions Gitano
users are, and are not, permitted to perform.

# Gitano admin users

Gitano recognises users based on the ssh key they use to log in. (Gitano is
also capable of using usernames and passwords though this is typically only
used over HTTP(s) and is described further on the Gitano Wiki.)  Each user may
have multiple keys, but each key may only be used by one user.

Gitano administrators need to be in the `gitano-admin` group.
When a Gitano instance is first created by the sysadmin
(by running `gitano-setup`), as part of the process an admin user is created.
This user belongs to the `gitano-admin` group.

While it may be easiest if the administrators of a Gitano instance have one
account that they both for normal Gitano use and for doing admin things, from a
security point of view, it is probably better to have a dedicated admin account
for doing admin stuff. Further, each admin should have their own admin account
on the Gitano instance so that it's easier to see who did what. This requires
the admins to have multiple keys, and to configure their ssh so that the right
key is used for each account. This can be one with stanzas in `~/.ssh/config`
such as these:

    Host gitanoadmin
    Hostname git.example.com
    User git
    IdentityFile /home/foo/.ssh/gitanoadmin.key

With a stanza like this, the `Host` name need to be used instead of
the usual name for the git server:

    git clone ssh://gitanoadmin/gitano-admin.git

# User and group management

Managing users and groups is a primary role for Gitano administrators.

Use the commands in the table to manage user and groups. For more
detail, give Gitano the command `help user` or `help group`.

-------             --------------------------------------------------
command             description
`user list`         list existing users
`user add`          create a new user
`user del`          remove a user
`group list`        list existing groups
`group show`        show the details of a particular group
`group add`         create a new group
`group del`         remove a group
`group desciption`  set description of group
`group adduser`     add user to group
`group deluser`     remove user from group
`group addgroup`    add group to another group
`group delgroup`    remove group from group
-------             --------------------------------------------------

Typically, groups are used to bestow privileges to users. Gitano
admins are added to the `gitano-admin` group. A site might have a
group `devs` for all the users who are developers and thus need to be
able to push changes to source code repositories. The site might also
have a group `ops`, whose members have read-only access to the source
code repositories so that they can deploy the software, while having
the permission to push changes to their operations repositories.

Creating a site policy such as the above is a job for that site's
Gitano admins. Gitano comes with a very basic policy by default.
The policy is specified (implemented) using Lace, which we'll look at later.


# Repository management

Repositories are managed using commands in the nearby table. Use the
Gitano `help` command to get details.

-------             ---------------------------------------------------
command             description
`ls`                list the repositories on the Gitano instance
`create`            create a new, empty repository
`destroy`           destroy a repository
`copy`              create a new repoistory by copying an existing one
`config`            inspect or set repository configuration
-------             ---------------------------------------------------

Configuration variables for repositories are listed in a table.

-------                 ---------------------------------------------------
variable                description
`project.archived`      Whether to hide from `ls` command and CGit output by default.
`project.description`   description of repo, shown by web interface
`project.head`          where the repository HEAD points, e.g., `refs/heads/master`
`project.owner`         Gitano user who owns the repository
-------                 ---------------------------------------------------

You can set any configuration varible, but the `project.*` ones have
special meaning to Gitano.  In addition if you are using CGit as your web
interface to your repositories, then `cgitrc.*` end up forwarded to the
repo stanza in the CGit config.


# Lace syntax and semantics

Lace is a language to describe access control rules for Gitano.

This chapter describes Lace in some detail. It is example driven:
rather than starting from a syntax BNF and then describing the
semantics of each construct, we'll skip the formalism and go through a
series of examples.  Note that not every example given here is complete
and we recommend that you read the `gitano-admin.git::rules/*.lace` files
to get a good grip on the default ruleset.

## The initial ruleset

When a Gitano instance is installed and configured by the sysadmin, a
repository called `gitano-admin` is automatically created. This
repository contains administrative information for the Gitano
instance:

* Site metadata: name, output prefix.
* Which users are created in Gitano, including any metadata about them
  (name, ssh keys).
* Ditto for groups.
* Lace rulesets for access control.

The Lace ruleset is in the directory `rules` in `gitano-admin`. A
default ruleset is inserted when the Gitano instance is created. Many
Gitano sites can just use that, but it is simplistic, and so it may be
worth adjusting it for your needs.

The root of the ruleset is in `rules/core.lace`. We will have a
walkthrough later, after we first cover some of the Lace language.

## First example

Starting with a fairly simple example, the below contains a rule to allow a
user to do anything to a repository prefixed by their username.

    define repo_is_usernamed repository prefix ${user}/
    allow "Users can do anything to repos beginning with their username" repo_is_usernamed

Lace rules are used by Gitano whenever the user tries to do anything.
Note that they only apply for access to the repositories via Gitano
(i.e., over the ssh protocol), and do not apply when access is via
other means (e.g., the git protocol itself). When they do apply,
however, they apply to everything: pulling, pushing, creating
repositories, etc.

Since Lace rules are evaluated from top to bottom, it is very important that
you not only define your rules well, but also define them in the right place in
the ruleset.  The first `deny` or `allow` rule which succeeds will immediately
terminate further rule processing.

When defining rules, you should bear in mind that a rule consists of a
condition, and either allow or deny access if the condition is true.
For example, the following two rules will allow access to cats, and
deny access to dogs:

    define user_is_cat user exact cat
    define user_is_dog user exact dog
    allow "Cats are cool" user_is_cat
    deny "Dogs drool too much" user_is_dog

The `define` statements define macros to simplify the conditions.
This is useful for more complicated things. For simpler things, like
the example above, you could write the condition directly into the
allow/deny statements:

    allow "Cats are cool" [user exact cat]
    deny "Dogs drool too much" [user exact dog]

What happens if user is neither `cat` nor `dog`? Neither condition will be
true, and so access is neither allowed nor denied by the above ruleset
snippet. Gitano would continue evaluating further rules. If no rule
triggers, Gitano uses the default, which is set with the the `default`
statement:

    default deny "The ruleset didn't provide access. Denying by default."

If a default isn't set, the opposite of the last statement is used. If
the last statement is `allow`, but didn't trigger, the default is
`deny`, and vice versa. This can be confusing, but works OK for very
short rulesets. For anything else, set an explicit default.  In addition,
once set, the default cannot be overridden later in the ruleset. The initial
Gitano ruleset begins with the above `default` statement.

## Lace language summary

The Lace language consists of the following constructs:

* `allow` and `deny` statements, with conditionals.
* Boolean expressions used in allow/deny statements.
* Macro definitions for boolean expressions, for making clearer
  conditionals.
* Includes to allow a ruleset to be split into multiple files.

The allow/deny statements look like this:

    allow "Everyone can see who they are" [operation exact whoami]
    deny "No more repos" [operation exact createrepo]

In other words, the action (`allow` or `deny`), a message shown to the
user if the action is taken, and a Boolean condition that decides if
the action should be taken. In the example above, the conditions are
`operation exact whoami` and `operation exact createrepo`.
These use the predicate
`operation`; predicates takes two arguments:

1.  A string comparison operator

    This can be one of:

    1.  `exact` if the operand must be exactly the same as the value.
        This makes the most sense for the `operation` or `user` operators.
        `is` is an alias for `exact`.
    2.  `prefix` if the value must begin with the operand.
        `starts` and `startswith` are aliases for `prefix`.
        `prefix` is useful for rules about branch namespaces,
        and may be used for repository namespaces.
    3.  `suffix` if the value must end with the operand.
        `ends` and `endswith` are aliases for `suffix`.
        `suffix` is useful for managing roles as suffixes to group names
        or defining rules which affect repos of the same name in different
        folders on the server.
    4.  `pattern` if the value must match a Lua string match expression.
    5.  `pcre` if the value must match a Perl-compatible regular expression.

    Or one of the above with `!` prepended to invert the result.

2.  The value to compare against.

In this case our condition evaluates to true
if the user is trying to do that operation.

## Predicates in conditions

Gitano defines a number of predicates to be used in conditions. See table.

Table: Gitano predicates

----------------------   -----------
`operation`              name of operation (gitano command)
`owner`                  username of repository owner
`group`                  any of the groups of invoker of gitano or target of `as`
`ref`                    the ref (branch, tag) being operated on
`user`                   username of user invoking gitano, or target of `as`
`repository`             path of repository being operated on
`start_tree`             any of the file names that are in the tree before the commit
`target_tree`            any of the file names that are in the tree after the commit
`treediff/targets`       any of the file names of changed files
`treediff/added`         any of the file names of added files
`treediff/deleted`       any of the file names of deleted files
`treediff/modified`      any of the file names of modified files
`treediff/renamed`       any of the file names of renamed files
`treediff/renamedto`     any of the file names of destinations of a rename
`treediff/kind/$FILE`    The type of object of a file named $FILE in the new version of the tree.
`treediff/oldkind/$FILE` The type of object of a file named $FILE in the old version of the tree.
`newtype`                Object type of the new tip of the ref (e.g. "tag" or "commit").
`oldtype`                Object type of the tip of the ref before the update.
`newsha`                 SHA1 Object ID of the new tip of the ref
`oldsha`                 SHA1 Object ID of the tip of the ref before the update.
`newtaggedtype`          If new tip of the ref is a tag, type of the object that is tagged.
`oldtaggedtype`          If old tip of the ref is a tag, type of the object that is tagged.
`newtaggedsha`           If new tip of the ref is a tag, object ID of the object that is tagged.
`oldtaggedsha`           If old tip of the ref is a tag, object ID of the object that is tagged.
`newsigned`              "yes" if the new tip of the ref is signed
`oldsigned`              "yes" if the old tip of the ref is signed
`config/*`               Value of the config option with "/" converted to ".".
`as_user`                username of user invoking `as otheruser`
`as_group`               any of the groups of user invoking `as otheruser`
`targetuser`             username in a user manipulation command
`targetgroup`            the group in a group manipulation command
`member`                 the user or group to be added to `targetgroup` in group manipulation commands.
`keyringname`            Name of the keyring being modified or inspected.
`key`                    Name of the configuration key being inspected or modified
`value`                  Value to set in configuration.
----------------------   -----------


Predicates can be combined using the operators `anyof` and `allof`:

    allow "Mammals are cool" anyof [user exact cat] [user exact dog]

These operators are followed by a list of conditions, and the result
is true if any condition, or all conditions, respectively, are true.
`anyof` is Boolean _OR_, `allof` is Boolean _AND_.

The result of an individual condition for `allow`, `deny`, `anyof` or `allof`,
may be negated with the boolean _NOT_ operation (`!`):

    deny "No cats" ![user exact cat]

Predicates may also have the negation of their operation specified,
so the following is equivalent to the above.

    deny "No cats" [user !exact cat]

## Variables for conditions

Gitano defines a number of variables to be used in conditions. See
table. These provide values that predicates test. The list of values
depends on the operation being run.

Table: Gitano variables

------------ ------------------- -----------------------------------------------------------------------
Operations   Variable            Description
all          operation           The current operation being run.
all          source              Protocol used to interact with Gitano. ("git", "http" or "ssh").
all          user                Current Gitano user or "gitano/anonymous".
all          config/\*           Any set config key with "." replaced with "/".
all          as\_user            Username of user invoking `as otheruser`.
all          keytag              Name of SSH key user authorised with, or "" via HTTP.
most         repository          Which repository is being operated on.
most         repository/$N       Component N of the repository path when split by "/".
most         repository/basename Last component of the repository split by "/".
most         repository/dirname  Components of repository split by "/" except for the last one.
config       key                 The key being modified or inspected.
config set   value               The value to assign to the key.
user modify  targetuser          User being created, renamed, deleted or modified.
group modify targetgroup         Group being modified
group modify targetgroup/$N      Component N of group when name is split by "-".
group modify targetgroup/suffix  Last component of group when name is split by "-".
group modify targetgroup/prefix  All but the last component of group when name is split by "-".
group modify member              User or group being added or removed from `targetgroup`.
group modify member/$N           Component N of user or group when name is split by "-".
group modify member/suffix       Last component of user or group when name is split by "-".
group modify member/prefix       All but the last component of user or group when name is split by "-".
graveyard    target              Name of destination when restoring. Name of entry when purging.
keyring      keyringname         Name of keyring being manipluated or inspected.
ref update   ref                 Name of the ref being updated.
ref update   newtype             Object type of the new tip of the ref (e.g. "tag" or "commit").
ref update   oldtype             Object type of the tip of the ref before the update.
ref update   newsha              SHA1 Object ID of the new tip of the ref
ref update   oldsha              SHA1 Object ID of the tip of the ref before the update.
ref update   newtaggedtype       If new tip of the ref is a tag, type of the object that is tagged.
ref update   oldtaggedtype       If old tip of the ref is a tag, type of the object that is tagged.
ref update   newtaggedsha        If new tip of the ref is a tag, object ID of the object that is tagged.
ref update   oldtaggedsha        If old tip of the ref is a tag, object ID of the object that is tagged.
ref update   newsigned           "yes" if the new tip of the ref is signed
ref update   oldsigned           "yes" if the old tip of the ref is signed
------------ ------------------- -----------------------------------------------------------------------

Variables are used as interpolations for the value of a predicate.

Interpolations are written in the form `${variable}`.
If the variable is not defined then it expands to the empty string.

So a rule that permits the owner of a repository to do whatever they want is:

    define repo_is_set repository pcre .
    define is_owner config/project/owner exact ${user}
    allow "Owners may do anything to repositories they own" repo_is_set is_owner

Since `user` and `config/project/owner` are both predicates and variables
`is_owner` can be written the other way around too.

    define is_owner user exact ${config/project/owner}

The only constraint to worry about when deciding if a term should be used as a
variable or as a predicate is that when expanding, variables can't have
multiple values.  So `group` can't be used as a variable, but can be a
predicate.

If you had a config option which was a list of the contributors to a project
you would be unable to check it with:

    define is_contributor user exact ${config/project/contributors}

However it you could check for it with:

    define is_contributor config/project/contributors exact ${user}

## Include statements in rulesets

A Lace statement may include another rules file. The search path is as
follows:

* If the included filename starts with `global:` it is included from
  the adminref (`master` branch of `gitano-admin.git`), directory
  `rules`. Thus, `include global:foo` means including
  `rules/foo.lace` from the adminref.

* Otherwise, without the global prefix,
  it is included from the per-project rules
  (`refs/gitano-admin` branch of the repository being operated on).

Include statements can be made conditional by adding a predicate after the path,
so you can split up your rules:

    #main.lace
    include update anyof [operation exact createref] [operation exact deleteref] [operation exact updaterefnonff]  [operation exact updaterefff]

    #update.lace
    # Require fast-forward updates to refs/heads/master
    deny "master may not be rebased" [ref exact refs/heads/master] [operation exact updaterefnonff]
    # Branches must not be tags
    deny "Branches may only be commits" [ref prefix refs/heads/] [newtype exact commit]

# Backup and restore of a Gitano instance

When gitano-setup is run, the admin needs to specify a Unix user in
whose home directory the git repositories stored. In this section
we'll assume the home directory is `/home/git`.

To backup a Gitano instance, simply backup `/home/git`. To restore, restore
the directory and ensure the user exists in the system.

# Stability of Gitano's interface

As an administrator, the stability of Gitano's interface is very important to
understand.

* **Rulesets**: During the v1.x series of releases, Gitano rulesets will
continue to work and while additional variables or predicates may be added,
nothing will be removed or renamed entirely unless failing to do so would
constitute a security risk.  This guarantee is not provided for a move from
v1.x to v2.x.  or from any v1.n to v1.(n-1).
* **Commands**: The command interface of Gitano is meant for humans to interact
with, and there is no stability of the command interface defined for the v1.x
series of Gitano.
* **Hooks**: The interface between Gitano and hooks is guaranteed to only
increase in functionality through the v1.x series unless failing to remove or
incompatibly alter functionality would constitute a security risk.
* **Plugins**: The plugin interface is considered entirely unstable at this
time and there is no guarantee that the current interfaces will remain stable
through the v1.x series.  Any rules, commands, hooks, etc, defined in published
plugins distributed with Gitano will be subject to the same constraints as
stated above.
* **Lua API**: The API of the Gitano Lua modules is an internal implementation
detail for the purposes of the v1.x series and should not be relied upon to
remain stable between any two releases in the series.

# Bypassing Gitano security

During setup of a Gitano instance, as well as the initial administrator user,
the `gitano-setup` tool also created a user called `gitano-bypass`.  The bypass
user is normally entirely unused, however it would behoove the sysadmin of the
Gitano instance to understand that to use an SSH key associated with the bypass
user will result in all rules, hooks, etc. being ignored.  This can cause
issues if hooks are used to manage effects of changing git repositories;
however it can also be the only way to correct certain issues (such as if an
instances' administrators lock themselves out).

Before using the bypass functionality, it is recommended that the sysadmin
consult the Gitano wiki and also any administrators of the instance to ensure
that they perform the minimum necessary change to restore access.

# Copyright and Licence terms

This administration manual is Copyright 2016-2017 Lars Wirzenius, Daniel
Silverstone, and Richard Maw.  In addition, the images are Copyright 2017
Maxine Green.

The manual content and images are provided under the terms of the Creative
Commons Attribution Sharealike 4.0 licence.  You can find the full terms of the
CC-BY-SA-4.0 licence at
<https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode>. The following
is a summary of the licence:

> You are free to:
>
> * Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format
> * Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material
>
> for any purpose, even commercially.
>
> The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license
> terms.
>
>
> Under the following terms:
>
> * Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the
>   license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable
>   manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your
>   use.
>
> * ShareAlike — If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you must
>   distribute your contributions under the same license as the original.
>
> No additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological
> measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.

In addition, if you are reading the HTML version, then the CSS is under the
Creative Commons Zero licence (see the header of the CSS document for details).