Git Gateway

Git Gateway is a Netlify open source project that allows you to add editors to your site CMS without giving them direct write access to your GitHub or GitLab repository. (For Bitbucket repositories, use the Bitbucket backend instead.)

Git Gateway with Netlify

The Netlify Identity service can handle the authentication and provides a simple interface for user management. The Netlify CMS featured templates are working examples of this backend.

To use it in your own project stored on GitHub or GitLab, follow these steps:

Head over to the Netlify Identity docs and follow the steps to get started.
Add the following lines to your Netlify CMS config.yml file:

backend:
  name: git-gateway

Reconnect after Changing Repository Permissions

If you change ownership on your repository, or convert a repository from public to private, you may need to reconnect Git Gateway with proper permissions. Find further instructions in the Netlify Git Gateway docs.

Git Gateway without Netlify

You can use Git Gateway without Netlify by setting up your own Git Gateway server and connecting it with your own instance of GoTrue (the open source microservice that powers Netlify Identity), or with any other identity service that can issue JSON Web Tokens (JWT).

To configure in Netlify CMS, use the same backend settings in your Netlify CMS config.yml file as described in Step 2 of the Git Gateway with Netlify Identity instructions above.

GitHub

For repositories stored on GitHub, the github backend allows CMS users to log in directly with their GitHub account. Note that all users must have push access to your content repository for this to work.

Because Github requires a server for authentication, Netlify facilitates basic GitHub authentication.

To enable basic GitHub authentication:

Follow the authentication provider setup steps in the Netlify docs.
Add the following lines to your Netlify CMS config.yml file:

backend:
  name: github
  repo: owner-name/repo-name # Path to your GitHub repository
  # optional, defaults to master
  # branch: main

Specifying a status for deploy previews

The GitHub backend supports deploy preview links. Netlify CMS checks the context of a commit's statuses and infers one that seems to represent a deploy preview. If you need to customize this behavior, you can specify which context to look for using preview_context:

backend:
  name: github
  repo: my/repo
  preview_context: my-provider/deployment

The above configuration would look for the status who's "context" is "my-provider/deployment".

Configuration Options

Configuration File

All configuration options for Netlify CMS are specified in a config.yml file, in the folder where you access the editor UI (usually in the /admin folder).

Alternatively, you can specify a custom config file using a link tag:

<!-- Note the "type" and "rel" attribute values, which are required. -->
<link href="path/to/config.yml" type="text/yaml" rel="cms-config-url">

To see working configuration examples, you can start from a template or check out the CMS demo site. (No login required: click the login button and the CMS will open.) You can refer to the demo configuration code to see how each option was configured.

You can find details about all configuration options below. Note that YAML syntax allows lists and objects to be written in block or inline style, and the code samples below include a mix of both.

Backend

This setting is required.

The backend option specifies how to access the content for your site, including authentication. Full details and code samples can be found in Backends.

Note: no matter where you access Netlify CMS — whether running locally, in a staging environment, or in your published site — it will always fetch and commit files in your hosted repository (for example, on GitHub), on the branch you configured in your Netlify CMS config.yml file. This means that content fetched in the admin UI will match the content in the repository, which may be different from your locally running site. It also means that content saved using the admin UI will save directly to the hosted repository, even if you're running the UI locally or in staging.

Publish Mode

By default, all entries created or edited in the Netlify CMS are committed directly into the main repository branch.

The publish_mode option allows you to enable "Editorial Workflow" mode for more control over the content publishing phases. All unpublished entries will be arranged in a board according to their status, and they can be further reviewed and edited before going live.

Note: Editorial workflow works with GitHub repositories, and support for GitLab and Bitbucket is in beta.

You can enable the Editorial Workflow with the following line in your Netlify CMS config.yml file:

# /admin/config.yml
publish_mode: editorial_workflow

From a technical perspective, the workflow translates editor UI actions into common Git commands:

Actions in Netlify UI

Perform these Git actions

Save draft

Commits to a new branch (named according to the pattern cms/collectionName/entrySlug), and opens a pull request

Edit draft

Pushes another commit to the draft branch/pull request

Approve and publish draft

Merges pull request and deletes branch

Media and Public Folders

Netlify CMS users can upload files to your repository using the Media Gallery. The following settings specify where these files are saved, and where they can be accessed on your built site.

Media Folder

This setting is required.

The media_folder option specifies the folder path where uploaded files should be saved, relative to the base of the repo.

media_folder: "static/images/uploads"

Public Folder

The public_folder option specifies the folder path where the files uploaded by the media library will be accessed, relative to the base of the built site. For fields controlled by [file] or [image] widgets, the value of the field is generated by prepending this path to the filename of the selected file. Defaults to the value of media_folder, with an opening / if one is not already included.

public_folder: "/images/uploads"

Based on the settings above, if a user used an image widget field called avatar to upload and select an image called philosoraptor.png, the image would be saved to the repository at /static/images/uploads/philosoraptor.png, and the avatar field for the file would be set to /images/uploads/philosoraptor.png.

This setting can be set to an absolute URL e.g. https://netlify.com/media should you wish, however in general this is not advisable as content should have relative paths to other content.

Media Library

Media library integrations are configured via the media_library property, and its value should be an object with at least a name property. A config property can also be used for options that should be passed to the library in use.

Example:

media_library:
  name: uploadcare
  config:
    publicKey: demopublickey

Site URL

The site_url setting should provide a URL to your published site. May be used by the CMS for various functionality. Used together with a collection's preview_path to create links to live content.

Example:

site_url: https://your-site.com

Display URL

When the display_url setting is specified, the CMS UI will include a link in the fixed area at the top of the page, allowing content authors to easily return to your main site. The text of the link consists of the URL without the protocol portion (e.g., your-site.com).

Defaults to site_url.

Example:

display_url: https://your-site.com

Custom Logo

When the logo_url setting is specified, the CMS UI will change the logo displayed at the top of the login page, allowing you to brand the CMS with your own logo. logo_url is assumed to be a URL to an image file.

Example:

logo_url: https://your-site.com/images/logo.svg

Locale

The CMS locale.

Defaults to en.

Other languages than English must be registered manually.

Example

In your config.yml:

locale: 'de'

And in your custom JavaScript code:

import CMS from 'netlify-cms-app';
import { de } from 'netlify-cms-locales';

CMS.registerLocale('de', de);

When a translation for the selected locale is missing the English one will be used.

When importing netlify-cms all locales are registered by default (so you only need to update your config.yml).

Show Preview Links

Deploy preview links can be disabled by setting show_preview_links to false.

Example:

show_preview_links: false

Search

The search functionally requires loading all collection(s) entries, which can exhaust rate limits on large repositories. It can be disabled by setting the top level search property to false.

Defaults to true

Example:

search: false

Slug Type

The slug option allows you to change how filenames for entries are created and sanitized. It also applies to filenames of media inserted via the default media library. For modifying the actual data in a slug, see the per-collection option below.

slug accepts multiple options:

encoding
- unicode (default): Sanitize filenames (slugs) according to RFC3987 and the WHATWG URL spec. This spec allows non-ASCII (or non-Latin) characters to exist in URLs.
- ascii: Sanitize filenames (slugs) according to RFC3986. The only allowed characters are (0-9, a-z, A-Z, _, -, ~).
clean_accents: Set to true to remove diacritics from slug characters before sanitizing. This is often helpful when using ascii encoding.
sanitize_replacement: The replacement string used to substitute unsafe characters, defaults to -.

Example

slug:
  encoding: "ascii"
  clean_accents: true
  sanitize_replacement: "_"

Collections

This setting is required.

The collections setting is the heart of your Netlify CMS configuration, as it determines how content types and editor fields in the UI generate files and content in your repository. Each collection you configure displays in the left sidebar of the Content page of the editor UI, in the order they are entered into your Netlify CMS config.yml file.

collections accepts a list of collection objects, each with the following options:

name (required): unique identifier for the collection, used as the key when referenced in other contexts (like the relation widget)
identifier_field: see detailed description below
label: label for the collection in the editor UI; defaults to the value of name
label_singular: singular label for certain elements in the editor; defaults to the value of label
description: optional text, displayed below the label when viewing a collection
files or folder (requires one of these): specifies the collection type and location; details in Collection Types
filter: optional filter for folder collections; details in Collection Types
create: for folder collections only; true allows users to create new items in the collection; defaults to false
publish: for publish_mode: editorial_workflow only; false hides UI publishing controls for a collection; defaults to true
hide: true hides a collection in the CMS UI; defaults to false. Useful when using the relation widget to hide referenced collections.
delete: false prevents users from deleting items in a collection; defaults to true
extension: see detailed description below
format: see detailed description below
frontmatter_delimiter: see detailed description under format
slug: see detailed description below
preview_path: see detailed description below
preview_path_date_field: see detailed description below
fields (required): see detailed description below
editor: see detailed description below
summary: see detailed description below
sortable_fields: see detailed description below
view_filters: see detailed description below
view_groups: see detailed description below

The last few options require more detailed information.

`identifier_field`

Netlify CMS expects every entry to provide a field named "title" that serves as an identifier for the entry. The identifier field serves as an entry's title when viewing a list of entries, and is used in slug creation. If you would like to use a field other than "title" as the identifier, you can set identifier_field to the name of the other field.

Example

collections:
  - name: posts
    identifier_field: name

`extension` and `format`

These settings determine how collection files are parsed and saved. Both are optional—Netlify CMS will attempt to infer your settings based on existing items in the collection. If your collection is empty, or you'd like more control, you can set these fields explicitly.

extension determines the file extension searched for when finding existing entries in a folder collection and it determines the file extension used to save new collection items. It accepts the following values: yml, yaml, toml, json, md, markdown, html.

You may also specify a custom extension not included in the list above, as long as the collection files can be parsed and saved in one of the supported formats below.

format determines how collection files are parsed and saved. It will be inferred if the extension field or existing collection file extensions match one of the supported extensions above. It accepts the following values:

yml or yaml: parses and saves files as YAML-formatted data files; saves with yml extension by default
toml: parses and saves files as TOML-formatted data files; saves with toml extension by default
json: parses and saves files as JSON-formatted data files; saves with json extension by default
frontmatter: parses files and saves files with data frontmatter followed by an unparsed body text (edited using a body field); saves with md extension by default; default for collections that can't be inferred. Collections with frontmatter format (either inferred or explicitly set) can parse files with frontmatter in YAML, TOML, or JSON format. However, they will be saved with YAML frontmatter.
yaml-frontmatter: same as the frontmatter format above, except frontmatter will be both parsed and saved only as YAML, followed by unparsed body text. The default delimiter for this option is ---.
toml-frontmatter: same as the frontmatter format above, except frontmatter will be both parsed and saved only as TOML, followed by unparsed body text. The default delimiter for this option is +++.
json-frontmatter: same as the frontmatter format above, except frontmatter will be both parsed and saved as JSON, followed by unparsed body text. The default delimiter for this option is { }.

`frontmatter_delimiter`

If you have an explicit frontmatter format declared, this option allows you to specify a custom delimiter like ~~~. If you need different beginning and ending delimiters, you can use an array like ["(", ")"].

`slug`

For folder collections where users can create new items, the slug option specifies a template for generating new filenames based on a file's creation date and title field. (This means that all collections with create: true must have a title field (a different field can be used via identifier_field).

The slug template can also reference a field value by name, eg. {{title}}. If a field name conflicts with a built in template tag name - for example, if you have a field named slug, and would like to reference that field via {{slug}}, you can do so by adding the explicit fields. prefix, eg. {{fields.slug}}.

Available template tags:

Any field can be referenced by wrapping the field name in double curly braces, eg. {{author}}
{{slug}}: a url-safe version of the title field (or identifier field) for the file
{{year}}: 4-digit year of the file creation date
{{month}}: 2-digit month of the file creation date
{{day}}: 2-digit day of the month of the file creation date
{{hour}}: 2-digit hour of the file creation date
{{minute}}: 2-digit minute of the file creation date
{{second}}: 2-digit second of the file creation date

Example:

slug: "{{year}}-{{month}}-{{day}}_{{slug}}"

Example using field names:

slug: "{{year}}-{{month}}-{{day}}_{{title}}_{{some_other_field}}"

Example using field name that conflicts with a template tag:

slug: "{{year}}-{{month}}-{{day}}_{{fields.slug}}"

`preview_path`

A string representing the path where content in this collection can be found on the live site. This allows deploy preview links to direct to lead to a specific piece of content rather than the site root of a deploy preview.

Available template tags:

Template tags are the same as those for slug, with the following exceptions:

{{slug}} is the entire slug for the current entry (not just the url-safe identifier, as is the case with slug configuration)
The date based template tags, such as {{year}} and {{month}}, are pulled from a date field in your entry, and may require additional configuration - see preview_path_date_field for details. If a date template tag is used and no date can be found, preview_path will be ignored.
{{dirname}} The path to the file's parent directory, relative to the collection's folder.
{{filename}} The file name without the extension part.
{{extension}} The file extension.

Examples:

collections:
  - name: posts
    preview_path: "blog/{{year}}/{{month}}/{{slug}}"

collections:
  - name: posts
    preview_path: "blog/{{year}}/{{month}}/{{filename}}.{{extension}}"

`preview_path_date_field`

The name of a date field for parsing date-based template tags from preview_path. If this field is not provided and preview_path contains date-based template tags (eg. {{year}}), Netlify CMS will attempt to infer a usable date field by checking for common date field names, such as date. If you find that you need to specify a date field, you can use preview_path_date_field to tell Netlify CMS which field to use for preview path template tags.

Example:

collections:
  - name: posts
    preview_path_date_field: "updated_on"

`fields`

The fields option maps editor UI widgets to field-value pairs in the saved file. The order of the fields in your Netlify CMS config.yml file determines their order in the editor UI and in the saved file.

fields accepts a list of collection objects, each with the following options:

name (required): unique identifier for the field, used as the key when referenced in other contexts (like the relation widget)
label: label for the field in the editor UI; defaults to the value of name
widget: defines editor UI and inputs and file field data types; details in Widgets
default: specify a default value for a field; available for most widget types (see Widgets for details on each widget type). Please note that field default value only works for folder collection type.
required: specify as false to make a field optional; defaults to true
pattern: add field validation by specifying a list with a regex pattern and an error message; more extensive validation can be achieved with custom widgets
comment: optional comment to add before the field (only supported for yaml)

In files with frontmatter, one field should be named body. This special field represents the section of the document (usually markdown) that comes after the frontmatter.

Example:

fields:
  - label: "Title"
    name: "title"
    widget: "string"
    pattern: ['.{20,}', "Must have at least 20 characters"]
  - {label: "Layout", name: "layout", widget: "hidden", default: "blog"}
  - {label: "Featured Image", name: "thumbnail", widget: "image", required: false}
  - {label: "Body", name: "body", widget: "markdown"}
    comment: 'This is a multiline\ncomment'

`editor`

This setting changes options for the editor view of a collection or a file inside a files collection. It has one option so far:

preview: set to false to disable the preview pane for this collection or file; defaults to true

Example:

  editor:
     preview: false

Note: Setting this as a top level configuration will set the default for all collections

`summary`

This setting allows the customization of the collection list view. Similar to the slug field, a string with templates can be used to include values of different fields, e.g. {{title}}. This option over-rides the default of title field and identifier_field.

Available template tags:

Template tags are the same as those for slug, with the following additions:

{{dirname}} The path to the file's parent directory, relative to the collection's folder.
{{filename}} The file name without the extension part.
{{extension}} The file extension.
{{commit_date}} The file commit date on supported backends (git based backends).
{{commit_author}} The file author date on supported backends (git based backends).

Example

    summary: "Version: {{version}} - {{title}}"

`sortable_fields`

An optional list of sort fields to show in the UI.

Defaults to inferring title, date, author and description fields and will also show Update On sort field in git based backends.

When author field can't be inferred commit author will be used.

Example

    # use dot notation for nested fields
    sortable_fields: ['commit_date', 'title', 'commit_author', 'language.en']

`view_filters`

An optional list of predefined view filters to show in the UI.

Defaults to an empty list.

Example

    view_filters:
      - label: "Alice's and Bob's Posts"
        field: author
        pattern: 'Alice|Bob'
      - label: 'Posts published in 2020'
        field: date
        pattern: '2020'
      - label: Drafts
        field: draft
        pattern: true

`view_groups`

An optional list of predefined view groups to show in the UI.

Defaults to an empty list.

Example

    view_groups:
      - label: Year
        field: date
        # groups items based on the value matched by the pattern
        pattern: \d{4}
      - label: Drafts
        field: draft

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Git Gateway

Git Gateway with Netlify

Reconnect after Changing Repository Permissions

Git Gateway without Netlify

GitHub

Specifying a status for deploy previews

Configuration Options

Configuration File

Backend

Publish Mode

Media and Public Folders

Media Folder

Public Folder

Media Library

Site URL

Display URL

Custom Logo

Locale

Show Preview Links

Search

Slug Type

Collections

identifier_field

extension and format

frontmatter_delimiter

slug

preview_path

preview_path_date_field

fields

editor

summary

sortable_fields

view_filters

view_groups

`identifier_field`

`extension` and `format`

`frontmatter_delimiter`

`slug`

`preview_path`

`preview_path_date_field`

`fields`

`editor`

`summary`

`sortable_fields`

`view_filters`

`view_groups`