Tugboat CLI

Tugboat CLI

Overview

Tugboat is a preview environment service (tugboatqa.com) that builds fully functional website previews for branches, tags, commits, and pull requests. This skill provides guidance for using the tugboat CLI to manage previews, services, repositories, and related resources.

Prerequisites

• The tugboat CLI must be installed (brew install tugboatqa/tugboat/tugboat-cli on macOS)
• An API access token must be configured (generated at https://dashboard.tugboatqa.com/access-tokens)
• Token is stored in ~/.tugboat.yml after first use, or passed via -t flag or TUGBOAT_API_TOKEN env var

Quick Start

To list available projects and repos:

tugboat ls projects
tugboat ls repos

To create a preview from a branch:

tugboat ls repos                                    # Find the repo ID
tugboat create preview <branch> repo=<repo-id>      # Create preview

To check preview status and open it:

tugboat ls previews repo=<repo-id>
tugboat ls <preview-id> -b                          # Open in browser

Common Workflows

Creating and Managing Previews

# Create a preview from a branch or PR
tugboat create preview <ref> repo=<repo-id>
tugboat create preview <ref> repo=<repo-id> type=pullrequest
tugboat create preview <ref> repo=<repo-id> base=false    # Skip base preview

# Preview lifecycle
tugboat refresh <preview-id>     # Pull latest code, run update+build
tugboat rebuild <preview-id>     # Full rebuild from scratch
tugboat reset <preview-id>       # Revert to post-build snapshot
tugboat redeploy <preview-id>    # Redeploy code

# State management
tugboat start <preview-id>
tugboat stop <preview-id>
tugboat suspend <preview-id>     # Save resources
tugboat cancel <preview-id>      # Cancel active build
tugboat delete <preview-id>      # Delete (add -f to skip confirmation)

Base Previews (Speed Up Builds)

Base previews are snapshots that child previews clone from instead of building from scratch.

# Create and anchor a base preview
tugboat create preview main repo=<repo-id> anchor=true

# Or anchor an existing preview
tugboat update <preview-id> anchor=true

# List base previews
tugboat ls previews repo=<repo-id> anchor=true

# Rebuild base to keep it fresh
tugboat rebuild <base-preview-id>

Debugging Previews

# Check build logs
tugboat log <preview-id>
tugboat log <preview-id> -a              # Attach and follow

# List services to find service IDs
tugboat ls services preview=<preview-id>

# Shell into a preview or service
tugboat shell <preview-id>               # Default service
tugboat shell <service-id>               # Specific service
tugboat shell <id> command="drush status"  # Run a command

# View service output
tugboat output <service-id>

Uploading a File Into a Preview (e.g. an HTML report)

There is no tugboat cp/upload command, and two non-obvious traps make naive approaches fail silently:

1. tugboat shell ... command= does NOT forward stdin. cat localfile | tugboat shell <id> command="cat > dest" produces an empty file — the pipe is ignored.
2. A plain string command= is split on whitespace and exec'd directly — it is NOT run through a shell. So command="echo hi > /tmp/x" passes > and /tmp/x as literal args to echo; redirects and pipes never happen.

The working pattern: pass command= a JSON array of argv (["bash","-c","<script>"]). A JSON array is honored verbatim, so the script string runs through a real shell with pipes/redirects intact. Carry the file content as base64 inside that script:

# 1. Find the default service ID and the docroot.
tugboat ls services preview=<preview-id>          # default service = the one with the preview URL
# Docroot is typically $TUGBOAT_ROOT/web (Drupal). $TUGBOAT_ROOT is usually /var/lib/tugboat.
# Confirm: tugboat shell <service-id> command="ls /var/lib/tugboat/web/index.php"

# 2. Build a JSON-array payload that base64-decodes the file into the docroot.
python3 - <<'PY'
import base64, json
src  = "report.html"                               # local file to upload
dest = "/var/lib/tugboat/web/report.html"          # path inside the preview docroot
b64 = base64.b64encode(open(src, "rb").read()).decode()
script = f"printf %s '{b64}' | base64 -d > '{dest}' && ls -l '{dest}'"
open("/tmp/tb-cmd.json", "w").write(json.dumps(["bash", "-c", script]))
print("b64 bytes:", len(b64))
PY

# 3. Hand the JSON array to tugboat shell via command substitution.
tugboat shell <service-id> command="$(cat /tmp/tb-cmd.json)"

# 4. The file is now served at the preview URL root, e.g.
#    https://pr<NN>-<hash>.tugboatqa.com/report.html
rm -f /tmp/tb-cmd.json

Re-uploading: preview files placed this way live outside git, so a tugboat rebuild (or a fresh build) wipes them — just re-run the steps above to restore the file. Use printf %s (not echo) so no trailing newline corrupts binary payloads.

Listing and Filtering Resources

# Projects, repos, previews
tugboat ls projects
tugboat ls repos
tugboat ls previews repo=<repo-id>

# Services, screenshots, visual diffs
tugboat ls services preview=<preview-id>
tugboat ls screenshots service=<service-id>
tugboat ls visualdiffs preview=<preview-id>

# Git info from repos
tugboat ls branches <repo-id>
tugboat ls pulls <repo-id>
tugboat ls pulls <repo-id> state=all     # Include closed PRs
tugboat ls tags <repo-id>

JSON Output for Scripting

Append -j or --json to any command for JSON output. Combine with -q for just IDs.

tugboat ls previews repo=<repo-id> -j
tugboat create preview main repo=<repo-id> -q    # Returns just the preview ID

Config Validation

Validate a .tugboat/config.yml before committing:

tugboat validate .tugboat/config.yml
tugboat validate <repo-id>              # Validate against a repo
tugboat validate <repo-id> <git-ref>    # Validate a specific ref

Config File (.tugboat/config.yml)

The .tugboat/config.yml file in a repository defines the Docker services and lifecycle commands for previews. For the full configuration schema including service properties, lifecycle phases (init, update, build, ready, online, start, clone), and environment variables, read references/cli_reference.md.

Key concepts:

• Services are Docker containers (e.g., apache, mysql, redis)
• The default: true service receives the preview URL
• The checkout: true service gets the git clone
• Lifecycle phases run commands at different stages (init for fresh builds, update for data imports, build for every build)
• Services can depend on each other via depends

Reference

For the complete command reference, configuration schema, environment variables, and API details, load references/cli_reference.md.