[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":792},["ShallowReactive",2],{"/en-us/blog/keeping-git-commit-history-clean":3,"navigation-en-us":36,"banner-en-us":436,"footer-en-us":446,"blog-post-authors-en-us-Kushal Pandya":688,"blog-related-posts-en-us-keeping-git-commit-history-clean":702,"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":25,"isFeatured":12,"meta":26,"navigation":27,"path":28,"publishedDate":20,"seo":29,"stem":33,"tagSlugs":34,"__hash__":35},"blogPosts/en-us/blog/keeping-git-commit-history-clean.yml","Keeping Git Commit History Clean",[7],"kushal-pandya",null,"engineering",{"slug":11,"featured":12,"template":13},"keeping-git-commit-history-clean",false,"BlogPost",{"title":15,"description":16,"authors":17,"heroImage":19,"date":20,"body":21,"category":9,"tags":22},"How (and why!) to keep your Git commit history clean","Git commit history is very easy to mess up, here's how you can fix it!",[18],"Kushal Pandya","https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1749659457/Blog/Hero%20Images/keep-git-commit-history-clean.jpg","2018-06-07","Git commits are one of the key parts of a [Git repository](/solutions/source-code-management/), and more so, the _commit message_ is a life log for the repository. As the project/repository evolves over time (new features getting added, bugs being fixed, architecture being refactored), commit messages are the place where one can see what was changed and how. So it's important that these messages reflect the underlying change in a short, precise manner.\n\n## Why a meaningful Git commit history is important\n\nWhat does Git commit do? Git commit messages are the fingerprints that you leave on the code you touch. Any code that you commit today, a year from now when you look at the same change; you would be thankful for a clear, meaningful commit message that you wrote, and it will also make the lives of your fellow developers easier. When Git commits are isolated based on context, a bug which was introduced by a single commit becomes quicker to find, and the easier it is to revert the commit which caused the bug in the first place.\n\nWhile working on a large project, we often deal with a lot of moving parts that are updated, added or removed. Ensuring that commit messages are maintained in such cases could be tricky, especially when development spans across days, weeks, or even months. So to simplify the effort of maintaining concise commit history, this article will use some of the common situations that a developer might face while working on a Git repository.\n\n- [Situation 1: I need to change the most recent commit](#situation-1-i-need-to-change-the-most-recent-commit)\n- [Situation 2: I need to change a specific commit](#situation-2-i-need-to-change-a-specific-commit)\n- [Situation 3: I need to add, remove, or combine commits](#situation-3-i-need-to-add-remove-or-combine-commits)\n- [Situation 4: My commit history doesn't make sense, I need a fresh start!](#situation-4-my-commit-history-doesnt-make-sense-i-need-a-fresh-start)\n\nBut before we dive in, let's quickly go through what a typical development workflow looks like in our hypothetical Ruby application.\n\n**Note:** This article assumes that you are aware about basics of Git, how branches work, how to add uncommitted changes of a branch to stage and how to commit the changes. If you're unsure of these flows, [our documentation](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/topics/git/index.html) is a great starting point.\n\n## A day in the life\n\nHere, we are working on a small Ruby on Rails project where we need to add a navigation view on the homepage and that involves updating and adding several files. Following is a step by step breakdown of the entire flow:\n\n- You start working on a feature with updating a single file; let's call it `application_controller.rb`\n- This feature requires you to also update a view: `index.html.haml`\n- You added a partial which is used in index page: `_navigation.html.haml`\n- Styles for the page also need to be updated to reflect the partial we added: `styles.css.scss`\n- Feature is now ready with the desired changes, time to also update tests; files to be updated are as follows:\n  - `application_controller_spec.rb`\n  - `navigation_spec.rb`\n- Tests are updated and passing as expected, now time to commit the changes!\n\nSince all the files belong to different territories of the architecture, we commit the changes isolated of each other to ensure that each commit represents a certain context and is made in a certain order. I usually prefer backend -> frontend order where most backend-centric change is committed first, followed by the middle layer and then by frontend-centric changes in the Git list commits.\n\n\n1.  `application_controller.rb` & `application_controller_spec.rb`; **Add routes for navigation**.\n2.  `_navigation.html.haml` &  `navigation_spec.rb`; **Page Navigation View**.\n3.  `index.html.haml`; **Render navigation partial**.\n4.  `styles.css.scss`; **Add styles for navigation**.\n\nNow that we have our changes committed, we create a merge request with the branch. Once you have merge request open, it typically gets reviewed by your peer before the changes are merged into repo's `master` branch. Now let's learn what different situations we may end up with during code review.\n\n## Situation 1: How to change the most recent Git commit\n\nImagine a case where the reviewer looked at `styles.css.scss` and suggested a change. In such a case, it is very simple to do the change as the stylesheet changes are part of **last** commit on your branch. Here's how we can handle this;\n\n- You directly do the necessary changes to `styles.css.scss` in your current branch.\n- Once you're done with the changes, add these changes to stage; run `git add styles.css.scss`.\n- Once changes are staged, we need to _add_ these changes to our last commit; run `git commit --amend`.\n  -  **Command breakdown**: Here, we're asking the `git commit` command to _amend_ whatever changes are present in stage to the most recent commit.\n- This will open your last commit in your Git-defined text editor which has the commit message **Add styles for navigation**.\n- Since we only updated the CSS declaration, we don't need to alter the commit message. At this point, you can just save and exit the text editor that Git opened for you and your changes will be reflected in the commit.\n\nSince you modified an existing Git commit, these changes are required to be _force pushed_ to your remote repo using `git push --force-with-lease \u003Cremote_name> \u003Cbranch_name>`. This command will override the commit `Add styles for navigation` on remote repo with updated commit that we just made in our local repo.\n\nOne thing to keep in mind while force pushing branches is that if you are working on the same branch with multiple people, force pushing may cause trouble for other users when they try to normally push their changes on a remote branch that has new commits force pushed. Hence, use this feature wisely. You can learn more about Git force push options [here](https://git-scm.com/docs/git-push#git-push---no-force-with-lease).\n\n## Situation 2: How to change a specific Git commit changes\n\nIn the previous situation, the Git commit change was rather simple as we had to modify only our last Git commit, but imagine if reviewer suggested to change something in `_navigation.html.haml`. In this case, it is second commit from the top, so changing it won't be as direct as it was in the first situation. Let's see how we can handle this:\n\nWhenever a commit is made in a branch, it is identified by a unique SHA-1 hash string. Think of it as a unique ID that separates one commit from another. You can view all the previous commits, along with their SHA-1 hashes in a branch by running the `git log` command. With this, you would see an output that looks somewhat as follows and is a list of commits, where the most recent commits are at the top;\n\n```text\ncommit aa0a35a867ed2094da60042062e8f3d6000e3952 (HEAD -> add-page-navigation)\nAuthor: Kushal Pandya \u003Ckushal@gitlab.com>\nDate: Wed May 2 15:24:02 2018 +0530\n\n    Add styles for navigation\n\ncommit c22a3fa0c5cdc175f2b8232b9704079d27c619d0\nAuthor: Kushal Pandya \u003Ckushal@gitlab.com>\nDate: Wed May 2 08:42:52 2018 +0000\n\n    Render navigation partial\n\ncommit 4155df1cdc7be01c98b0773497ff65c22ba1549f\nAuthor: Kushal Pandya \u003Ckushal@gitlab.com>\nDate: Wed May 2 08:42:51 2018 +0000\n\n    Page Navigation View\n\ncommit 8d74af102941aa0b51e1a35b8ad731284e4b5a20\nAuthor: Kushal Pandya \u003Ckushal@gitlab.com>\nDate: Wed May 2 08:12:20 2018 +0000\n\n    Add routes for navigation\n\n```\n\nThis is where `git rebase` command comes into play. Whenever we wish to edit a specific commit with `git rebase`, we need to first rebase our branch by moving back HEAD to the point right _before_ the commit we wish to edit. In our case, we need to change the commit that reads `Page Navigation View`.\n\n![Commit Log](https://about.gitlab.com/images/blogimages/keeping-git-commit-history-clean/GitRebase.png){: .shadow.center.medium}\n\nHere, notice the hash of commit which is right before the commit we want to modify; copy the hash and perform the following steps:\n\n- Rebase the branch to move to commit before our target commit; run `git rebase -i 8d74af102941aa0b51e1a35b8ad731284e4b5a20`\n  -  **Git command breakdown**: Here we're running Git's `rebase` command with _interactive_ mode with provided SHA-1 hash as commit to rebase to.\n- This will run rebase command for Git in interactive mode and will open your text editor showing all of your commits that came _after_ the commit you rebased to. It will look somewhat like this:\n\n```text\npick 4155df1cdc7 Page Navigation View\npick c22a3fa0c5c Render navigation partial\npick aa0a35a867e Add styles for navigation\n\n# Rebase 8d74af10294..aa0a35a867e onto 8d74af10294 (3 commands)\n#\n# Commands:\n# p, pick = use commit\n# r, reword = use commit, but edit the commit message\n# e, edit = use commit, but stop for amending\n# s, squash = use commit, but meld into previous commit\n# f, fixup = like \"squash\", but discard this commit's log message\n# x, exec = run command (the rest of the line) using shell\n# d, drop = remove Git commit\n#\n# These lines can be re-ordered; they are executed from top to bottom.\n#\n# If you remove a line here THAT COMMIT WILL BE LOST.\n#\n# However, if you remove everything, the rebase will be aborted.\n#\n# Note that empty commits are commented out\n```\n\nNotice how each commit has a word `pick` in front of it, and in the contents below, there are all possible keywords we can use. Since we want to _edit_ a commit, we need to change `pick 4155df1cdc7 Page Navigation View` to `edit 4155df1cdc7 Page Navigation View`. Save the changes and exit editor.\n\nNow your branch is rebased to the point in time right before the commit you made which included `_navigation.html.haml`. Open the file and perform desired changes as per the review feedback. Once you're done with the changes, stage them by running `git add _navigation.html.haml`.\n\nSince we have staged the changes, it is time to move branch HEAD back to the commit we originally had (while also including the new changes we added), run `git rebase --continue`, this will open your default editor in the terminal and show you the commit message that we edited during rebase; `Page Navigation View`. You can change this message if you wish, but we would leave it as it is for now, so save and exit the editor. At this point, Git will replay all the commits that followed after the commit you just edited and now branch `HEAD` is back to the top commit we originally had, and it also includes the new changes you made to one of the commits.\n\nSince we again modified a commit that's already present in remote repo, we need force push this branch again using `git push --force-with-lease \u003Cremote_name> \u003Cbranch_name>`.\n\n## Situation 3: How to add, remove, or combine Git commits\n\nA common situation is when you've made several commits just to fix something previously committed. Now let's reduce them as much as we can, combining them with the original commits.\n\nAll you need to do is start the interactive rebase as you would in the other scenarios.\n\n```text\npick 4155df1cdc7 Page Navigation View\npick c22a3fa0c5c Render navigation partial\npick aa0a35a867e Add styles for navigation\npick 62e858a322 Fix a typo\npick 5c25eb48c8 Ops another fix\npick 7f0718efe9 Fix 2\npick f0ffc19ef7 Argh Another fix!\n```\n\nNow imagine you want to combine all those fixes into `c22a3fa0c5c Render navigation partial`. You just need to:\n\n1. Move the fixes up so that they are right below the commit you want to keep in the end.\n2. Change `pick` to `squash` or `fixup` for each of the fixes.\n\n*Note:* `squash` keeps the git fix commit messages in the description. `fixup` will forget the commit messages of the fixes and keep the original.\n\nYou'll end up with something like this:\n\n```text\npick 4155df1cdc7 Page Navigation View\npick c22a3fa0c5c Render navigation partial\nfixup 62e858a322 Fix a typo\nfixup 5c25eb48c8 Ops another fix\nfixup 7f0718efe9 Fix 2\nfixup f0ffc19ef7 Argh Another fix!\npick aa0a35a867e Add styles for navigation\n```\n\nSave the changes, exit the editor, and you're done! This is the resulting history:\n\n```text\npick 4155df1cdc7 Page Navigation View\npick 96373c0bcf Render navigation partial\npick aa0a35a867e Add styles for navigation\n```\n\nAs before, all you need to do now is `git push --force-with-lease \u003Cremote_name> \u003Cbranch_name>` and the changes are up.\n\nIf you want to remove a Git commit from branch altogether, instead of `squash` or `fixup`, just write `drop` or simply delete that line.\n\n### How to avoid Git commit conflicts\n\nTo avoid conflicts, make sure the commits you're moving up the timeline aren't touching the same files touched by the commits left after them.\n\n```text\npick 4155df1cdc7 Page Navigation View\npick c22a3fa0c5c Render navigation partial\nfixup 62e858a322 Fix a typo                 # this changes styles.css\nfixup 5c25eb48c8 Ops another fix            # this changes image/logo.svg\nfixup 7f0718efe9 Fix 2                      # this changes styles.css\nfixup f0ffc19ef7 Argh Another fix!          # this changes styles.css\npick aa0a35a867e Add styles for navigation  # this changes index.html (no conflict)\n```\n\n### Pro-tip: Quick Git commit `fixup`s\n\nIf you know exactly which commit you want to fixup, when committing you don't have to waste brain cycles thinking of good temporary names for \"Fix 1\", \"Fix 2\", ..., \"Fix 42\".\n\n**Step 1: Meet `--fixup`**\n\nAfter you've staged the changes fixing whatever it is that needs fixing, just Git commit all the changes like this:\n\n```shell\ngit commit --fixup c22a3fa0c5c\n```\n(Note that this is the hash for the commit `c22a3fa0c5c Render navigation partial`)\n\nThis will generate this commit message: `fixup! Render navigation partial`.\n\n**Step 2: And the sidekick `--autosquash`**\n\nEasy interactive rebase. You can have `git` place the `fixup`s automatically in the right place.\n\n`git rebase -i 4155df1cdc7 --autosquash`\n\nHistory will be shown like so:\n```text\npick 4155df1cdc7 Page Navigation View\npick c22a3fa0c5c Render navigation partial\nfixup 62e858a322 Fix a typo\nfixup 5c25eb48c8 Ops another fix\nfixup 7f0718efe9 Fix 2\nfixup f0ffc19ef7 Argh Another fix!\npick aa0a35a867e Add styles for navigation\n```\n\nReady for you to just review and proceed.\n\nIf you're feeling adventurous you can do a non-interactive rebase `git rebase --autosquash`, but only if you like living dangerously, as you'll have no opportunity to review the squashes being made before they're applied.\n\n## Situation 4: My Git commit history doesn't make sense, I need a fresh start!\n\nIf we're working on a large feature, it is common to have several fixup and review-feedback changes that are being committed frequently. Instead of constantly rebasing the branch, we can leave the cleaning up of Git commits until the end of development.\n\nThis is where creating patch files is extremely handy. In fact, patch files were the primary way of sharing code over email while collaborating on large open source projects before Git-based services like GitLab were available to developers. Imagine you have one such branch (eg; `add-page-navigation`) where there are tons of commits that don't convey the underlying changes clearly. Here's how you can create a patch file for all the changes you made in this branch:\n\n- The first step to create the patch file is to make sure that your branch has all the changes present from `master` branch and has no conflicts with the same.\n- You can run `git rebase master` or `git merge master` while you're checked out in `add-page-navigation` branch to get all the changes from `master` on to your branch.\n- Now create the patch file; run `git diff master add-page-navigation > ~/add_page_navigation.patch`.\n  -  **Command breakdown**: Here we're using Git's _diff_ feature, and asking for a diff between `master` branch and `add-page-navigation` branch, and _redirecting_ the output (via `>` symbol) to a file named `add_page_navigation.patch` in our user home directory (typically `~/` in *nix operating systems).\n- You can specify any path you wish to keep this file in and the file name and extension could be anything you want.\n- Once the command is run and you don't see any errors, the patch file is generated.\n- Now checkout `master` branch; run `git checkout master`.\n- Delete the branch `add-page-navigation` from local repo; run `git branch -D add-page-navigation`. Remember, we already have changes of this branch in a created patch file.\n- Now create a new branch with the same name (while `master` is checked out); run `git checkout -b add-page-navigation`.\n- At this point, this is a fresh branch and doesn't have any of your changes.\n- Finally, apply your changes from the patch file; `git apply ~/add_page_navigation.patch`.\n- Here, all of your changes are applied in a branch and they will appear as uncommitted, as if all your modification where done, but none of the modifications were actually committed in the branch.\n- Now you can go ahead and commit individual files or files grouped by area of impact in the order you want with concise commit messages.\n\nAs with previous situations, we basically modified the whole branch, so it is time to force push!\n\n## Git commit history: Conclusion\n\nWhile we have covered most common and basic situations that arise in a day-to-day workflow with Git, rewriting Git history is a vast topic and as you get familiar with above tips, you can learn more advanced concepts around the subject in the [Git Official Documentation](https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Tools-Rewriting-History). Happy git'ing!\n\nPhoto by [pan xiaozhen](https://unsplash.com/photos/pj-BrFZ9eAA?utm_source=unsplash&utm_medium=referral&utm_content=creditCopyText) on [Unsplash](https://unsplash.com/search/photos/clean?utm_source=unsplash&utm_medium=referral&utm_content=creditCopyText)\n",[23,24],"git","workflow","yml",{},true,"/en-us/blog/keeping-git-commit-history-clean",{"title":15,"description":16,"ogTitle":15,"ogDescription":16,"noIndex":12,"ogImage":19,"ogUrl":30,"ogSiteName":31,"ogType":32,"canonicalUrls":30},"https://about.gitlab.com/blog/keeping-git-commit-history-clean","https://about.gitlab.com","article","en-us/blog/keeping-git-commit-history-clean",[23,24],"ri0o0xVjna6ZlAqgBXyAvBPo2Dzm6DXJhCzVF3uh5Aw",{"data":37},{"logo":38,"freeTrial":43,"sales":48,"login":53,"items":58,"search":366,"minimal":397,"duo":416,"pricingDeployment":426},{"config":39},{"href":40,"dataGaName":41,"dataGaLocation":42},"/","gitlab logo","header",{"text":44,"config":45},"Get free 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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.",[708],"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",[258,610,712],"open source","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":715,"featured":12,"template":13},"how-iit-bombay-students-code-future-with-gitlab",{"content":717,"config":726},{"title":718,"description":719,"authors":720,"heroImage":721,"date":722,"category":9,"tags":723,"body":725},"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.",[708],"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",[610,258,724],"product","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":727,"featured":27,"template":13},"artois-university-elevates-curriculum-with-gitlab-ultimate-for-education",{"content":729,"config":741},{"category":9,"tags":730,"body":732,"date":733,"updatedDate":734,"heroImage":735,"authors":736,"title":739,"description":740},[731,23,105],"tutorial","\nEnterprise teams are increasingly migrating from Azure DevOps to GitLab to gain strategic advantages and accelerate secure software delivery. \n\n\n- GitLab comes with integrated controls, policies, and [compliance frameworks](https://docs.gitlab.com/user/compliance/compliance_frameworks/) that allow organizations to implement software delivery standards at scale. This is especially important for regulated industries.\n\n- [Security testing](https://docs.gitlab.com/user/application_security/) is embedded in the pipeline and results show in the developer workflow, including static application security testing (SAST), source code analysis (SCA), dynamic application security testing (DAST), infrastructure-as-code scanning (IaC), container scanning, and API scanning.\n\n- [AI capabilities](https://about.gitlab.com/gitlab-duo-agent-platform/) across the full software delivery lifecycle include advanced agent orchestration and customizable flows to support how your organizational teams work.\n\n\nGitLab's open-source, open-core approach, flexible deployment options such as single-tenant dedicated and self-managed, and truly unified platform eliminate integration complexity and security gaps. \n\n\nFor teams facing mounting pressure to accelerate delivery while strengthening security posture and maintaining regulatory compliance, GitLab represents not just a migration but a platform evolution.\n\n\nMigrating from Azure DevOps to GitLab can seem like a daunting task, but with the right approach and tools, it can be a smooth and efficient process. This guide will walk you through the steps needed to successfully migrate your projects, repositories, and pipelines from Azure DevOps to GitLab.\n\n\n## Overview\n\nGitLab provides both [Congregate](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/professional-services-automation/tools/migration/congregate/) (maintained by [GitLab Professional Services](https://about.gitlab.com/professional-services/) organization) and [a built-in Git repository import](https://docs.gitlab.com/user/project/import/repo_by_url/) for migrating projects from Azure DevOps (ADO). These options support repository-by-repository or bulk migration and preserve git commit history, branches, and tags. With Congregate and professional services tools, we support additional assets such as wikis, work items, CI/CD variables, container images, packages, pipelines, and more (see this [feature matrix](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/professional-services-automation/tools/migration/congregate/-/blob/master/customer/ado-migration-features-matrix.md)). Use this guide to plan and execute your migration and complete post-migration follow-up tasks.\n\n\nEnterprises migrating from ADO to GitLab commonly follow a multi-phase approach:\n\n\n- Migrate repositories from ADO to GitLab using Congregate or GitLab's built-in repository migration.\n\n- Migrate pipelines from Azure Pipelines to GitLab CI/CD.\n\n- Migrate remaining assets such as boards, work items, and artifacts to GitLab Issues, Epics, and the Package and Container Registries.\n\n\nHigh-level migration phases:\n\n\n```mermaid\ngraph LR\n    subgraph Prerequisites\n        direction TB\n        A[\"Set up identity provider (IdP) and\u003Cbr/>provision users\"]\n        A --> B[\"Set up runners and\u003Cbr/>third-party integrations\"]\n        B --> I[\"Users enablement and\u003Cbr/>change management\"]\n    end\n    \n    subgraph MigrationPhase[\"Migration phase\"]\n        direction TB\n        C[\"Migrate source code\"]\n        C --> D[\"Preserve contributions and\u003Cbr/> format history\"]\n        D --> E[\"Migrate work items and\u003Cbr/>map to \u003Ca href=\"https://docs.gitlab.com/topics/plan_and_track/\">GitLab Plan \u003Cbr/>and track work\"]\n    end\n    \n    subgraph PostMigration[\"Post-migration steps\"]\n        direction TB\n        F[\"Create or translate \u003Cbr/>ADO pipelines to GitLab CI\"]\n        F --> G[\"Migrate other assets\u003Cbr/>packages and container images\"]\n        G --> H[\"Introduce \u003Ca href=\"https://docs.gitlab.com/user/application_security/secure_your_application/\">security\u003C/a> and\u003Cbr/>SDLC improvements\"]\n    end\n    \n    Prerequisites --> MigrationPhase\n    MigrationPhase --> PostMigration\n\n    style A fill:#FC6D26\n    style B fill:#FC6D26\n    style I fill:#FC6D26\n    style C fill:#8C929D\n    style D fill:#8C929D\n    style E fill:#8C929D\n    style F fill:#FFA500\n    style G fill:#FFA500\n    style H fill:#FFA500\n```\n\n\n## Planning your migration\n\n\n**To plan your migration, ask these questions:**\n\n\n- How soon do we need to complete the migration?\n\n- Do we understand what will be migrated?\n\n- Who will run the migration?\n\n- What organizational structure do we want in GitLab?\n\n- Are there any constraints, limitations, or pitfalls that need to be taken into account?\n\n\nDetermine your timeline, as it will largely dictate your migration approach. Identify champions or groups familiar with both ADO and GitLab platforms (such as early adopters) to help drive adoption and provide guidance.\n\n\n**Inventory what you need to migrate:**\n\n\n- The number of repositories, pull requests, and contributors\n\n- The number and complexity of work items and pipelines\n\n- Repository sizes and dependency relationships\n\n- Critical integrations and runner requirements (agent pools with specific capabilities)\n\n\nUse GitLab Professional Services's [Evaluate](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/professional-services-automation/tools/utilities/evaluate#beta-azure-devops) tool to produce a complete inventory of your entire Azure DevOps organization, including repositories, PR counts, contributor lists, number of pipelines, work items, CI/CD variables and more. If you're working with the GitLab Professional Services team, share this report with your engagement manager or technical architect to help plan the migration.\n\n\nMigration timing is primarily driven by pull request count, repository size, and amount of contributions (e.g. comments in PR, work items, etc). For example, 1,000 small repositories with few PRs and limited contributors can migrate much faster than a smaller set of repositories containing tens of thousands of PRs and thousands of contributors. Use your inventory data to estimate effort and plan test runs before proceeding with production migrations.\n\n\nCompare inventory against your desired timeline and decide whether to migrate all repositories at once or in batches. If teams cannot migrate simultaneously, batch and stagger migrations to align with team schedules. For example, in Professional Services engagements, we organize migrations into waves of 200-300 projects to manage complexity and respect API rate limits, both in [GitLab](https://docs.gitlab.com/security/rate_limits/) and [ADO](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/integrate/concepts/rate-limits?view=azure-devops).\n\n\nGitLab's built-in [repository importer](https://docs.gitlab.com/user/project/import/repo_by_url/) migrates Git repositories (commits, branches, and tags) one-by-one. Congregate is designed to preserve pull requests (known in GitLab as merge requests), comments, and related metadata where possible; the simple built-in repository import focuses only on the Git data (history, branches, and tags).\n\n\n**Items that typically require separate migration or manual recreation:**\n\n\n- Azure Pipelines - create equivalent GitLab CI/CD pipelines (consult with [CI/CD YAML](https://docs.gitlab.com/ci/yaml/) and/or with [CI/CD components](https://docs.gitlab.com/ci/components/)). Alternatively, consider using AI-based pipeline conversion available in Congregate.\n\n- Work items and boards - map to GitLab Issues, Epics, and Issue Boards.\n\n- Artifacts, container images (ACR) - migrate to GitLab Package Registry or Container Registry.\n\n- Service hooks and external integrations - recreate in GitLab.\n\n- [Permissions models](https://docs.gitlab.com/user/permissions/) differ between ADO and GitLab; review and plan permissions mapping rather than assuming exact preservation.\n\n\nReview what each tool (Congregate vs. built-in import) will migrate and choose the one that fits your needs. Make a list of any data or integrations that must be migrated or recreated manually.\n\n\n**Who will run the migration?**\n\n\nMigrations are typically run by a GitLab group owner or instance administrator, or by a designated migrator who has been granted the necessary permissions on the destination group/project. Congregate and the GitLab import APIs require valid authentication tokens for both Azure DevOps and GitLab.\n\n\n- Decide whether a group owner/admin will perform the migrations or whether you will grant a specific team/person delegated access.\n\n- Ensure the migrator has correctly configured personal access tokens (Azure DevOps and GitLab) with the scopes required by your chosen migration tool (for example, api/read_repository scopes and any tool-specific requirements). \n\n- Test tokens and permissions with a small pilot migration.\n\n**Note:** Congregate leverages file-based import functionality for ADO migrations and requires instance administrator permissions to run ([see our documentation](https://docs.gitlab.com/user/project/settings/import_export/#migrate-projects-by-uploading-an-export-file)). If you are migrating to GitLab.com, consider engaging Professional Services. For more information, see the [Professional Services Full Catalog](https://about.gitlab.com/professional-services/catalog/). Non-admin account cannot preserve contribution attribution!\n\n\n**What organizational structure do we want in GitLab?**\n\nWhile it's possible to map ADO structure directly to GitLab structure, it's recommended to rationalize and simplify the structure during migration. Consider how teams will work in GitLab and design the structure to facilitate collaboration and access management. Here is a way to think about mapping ADO structure to GitLab structure:\n\n\n```mermaid\ngraph TD\n    subgraph GitLab\n        direction TB\n        A[\"Top-level Group\"]\n        B[\"Subgroup (optional)\"]\n        C[\"Projects\"]\n        A --> B\n        A --> C\n        B --> C\n    end\n\n    subgraph AzureDevOps[\"Azure DevOps\"]\n        direction TB\n        F[\"Organizations\"]\n        G[\"Projects\"]\n        H[\"Repositories\"]\n        F --> G\n        G --> H\n    end\n\n    style A fill:#FC6D26\n    style B fill:#FC6D26\n    style C fill:#FC6D26\n    style F fill:#8C929D\n    style G fill:#8C929D\n    style H fill:#8C929D\n```\n\nRecommended approach:\n\n\n- Map each ADO organization to a GitLab group (or a small set of groups), not to many small groups. Avoid creating a GitLab group for every ADO team project. Use migration as an opportunity to rationalize your GitLab structure.\n\n- Use subgroups and project-level permissions to group related repositories.\n\n- Manage access to sets of projects by using GitLab groups and group membership (groups and subgroups) rather than one group per team project.\n\n- Review GitLab [permissions](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/user/permissions.html) and consider [SAML Group Links](https://docs.gitlab.com/user/group/saml_sso/group_sync/) to implement an enterprise RBAC model for your GitLab instance (or a GitLab.com namespace).\n\n\n**ADO Boards and work items: State of migration**\n\n\nIt's important to understand how work items migrate from ADO into GitLab Plan (issues, epics, and boards).\n\n\n- ADO Boards and work items map to GitLab Issues, Epics, and Issue Boards. Plan how your workflows and board configurations will translate.\n\n- ADO Epics and Features become GitLab Epics.\n\n- Other work item types (e.g., user stories, tasks, bugs) become project-scoped issues.\n\n- Most standard fields are preserved; selected custom fields can be migrated when supported.\n\n- Parent-child relationships are retained so Epics reference all related issues.\n\n- Links to pull requests are converted to merge request links to maintain development traceability.\n\n\nExample: Migration of an individual work item to a GitLab Issue, including field accuracy and relationships:\n\n\n![Example: Migration of an individual work item to a GitLab Issue](https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1764769188/ztesjnxxfbwmfmtckyga.png)\n\n\nBatching guidance:\n\n\n- If you need to run migrations in batches, use your new group/subgroup structure to define batches (for example, by ADO organization or by product area).\n\n- Use inventory reports to drive batch selection and test each batch with a pilot migration before scaling.\n\n\n**Pipelines migration**\n\n\nCongregate [recently introduced](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/professional-services-automation/tools/migration/congregate/-/merge_requests/1298) AI-powered conversion for multi-stage YAML pipelines from Azure DevOps to GitLab CI/CD. This automated conversion works best for simple, single-file pipelines and is designed to provide a working starting point rather than a production-ready `.gitlab-ci.yml` file. The tool generates a functionally equivalent GitLab pipeline that you can then refine and optimize for your specific needs.\n\n\n- Converts Azure Pipelines YAML to `.gitlab-ci.yml` format automatically.\n\n- Best suited for straightforward, single-file pipeline configurations.\n\n- Provides a boilerplate to accelerate migration, not a final production artifact.\n\n- Requires review and adjustment for complex scenarios, custom tasks, or enterprise requirements.\n\n- Does not support Azure DevOps classic release pipelines — [convert these to multi-stage YAML](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/pipelines/release/from-classic-pipelines?view=azure-devops) first.\n\n\nRepository owners should review the [GitLab CI/CD documentation](https://docs.gitlab.com/ci/) to further optimize and enhance their pipelines after the initial conversion.\n\n\nExample of converted pipelines:\n\n\n```yml \n\n# azure-pipelines.yml\n\ntrigger:\n  - main\n\nvariables:\n  imageName: myapp\n\nstages:\n  - stage: Build\n    jobs:\n      - job: Build\n        pool:\n          vmImage: 'ubuntu-latest'\n        steps:\n          - checkout: self\n\n          - task: Docker@2\n            displayName: Build Docker image\n            inputs:\n              command: build\n              repository: $(imageName)\n              Dockerfile: '**/Dockerfile'\n              tags: |\n                $(Build.BuildId)\n\n  - stage: Test\n    jobs:\n      - job: Test\n        pool:\n          vmImage: 'ubuntu-latest'\n        steps:\n          - checkout: self\n\n          # Example: run tests inside the container\n          - script: |\n              docker run --rm $(imageName):$(Build.BuildId) npm test\n            displayName: Run tests\n\n  - stage: Push\n    jobs:\n      - job: Push\n        pool:\n          vmImage: 'ubuntu-latest'\n        steps:\n          - checkout: self\n\n          - task: Docker@2\n            displayName: Login to ACR\n            inputs:\n              command: login\n              containerRegistry: '\u003Cyour-acr-service-connection>'\n\n          - task: Docker@2\n            displayName: Push image to ACR\n            inputs:\n              command: push\n              repository: $(imageName)\n              tags: |\n                $(Build.BuildId)\n\n```\n\n```yaml\n\n# .gitlab-ci.yml\n\nvariables:\n  imageName: myapp\n\nstages:\n  - build\n  - test\n  - push\n\nbuild:\n  stage: build\n  image: docker:latest\n  services:\n    - docker:dind\n  script:\n    - docker build -t $imageName:$CI_PIPELINE_ID -f $(find . -name Dockerfile) .\n  only:\n    - main\n\ntest:\n  stage: test\n  image: docker:latest\n  services:\n    - docker:dind\n  script:\n    - docker run --rm $imageName:$CI_PIPELINE_ID npm test\n  only:\n    - main\n\npush:\n  stage: push\n  image: docker:latest\n  services:\n    - docker:dind\n  before_script:\n    - docker login -u $CI_REGISTRY_USER -p $CI_REGISTRY_PASSWORD $CI_REGISTRY\n  script:\n    - docker tag $imageName:$CI_PIPELINE_ID $CI_REGISTRY/$CI_PROJECT_PATH/$imageName:$CI_PIPELINE_ID\n    - docker push $CI_REGISTRY/$CI_PROJECT_PATH/$imageName:$CI_PIPELINE_ID\n  only:\n    - main\n\n```\n\n**Final checklist:**\n\n\n- Decide timeline and batch strategy.\n\n- Produce a full inventory of repositories, PRs, and contributors.\n\n- Choose Congregate or the built-in import based on scope (PRs and metadata vs. Git data only).\n\n- Decide who will run migrations and ensure tokens/permissions are configured.\n\n- Identify assets that must be migrated separately (pipelines, work items, artifacts, and hooks) and plan those efforts.\n\n- Run pilot migrations, validate results, then scale according to your plan.\n\n\n## Running your migrations\n\n\nAfter planning, execute migrations in stages, starting with trial runs. Trial migrations help surface org-specific issues early and let you measure duration, validate outcomes, and fine-tune your approach before production.\n\n\nWhat trial migrations validate:\n\n\n- Whether a given repository and related assets migrate successfully (history, branches, tags; plus MRs/comments if using Congregate)\n\n- Whether the destination is usable immediately (permissions, runners, CI/CD variables, integrations)\n\n- How long each batch takes, to set schedules and stakeholder expectations\n\n\nDowntime guidance:\n\n\n- GitLab's built-in Git import and Congregate do not inherently require downtime.\n\n- For production waves, freeze changes in ADO (branch protections or read-only) to avoid missed commits, PR updates, or work items created mid-migration.\n\n- Trial runs do not require freezes and can be run anytime.\n\n\nBatching guidance:\n\n\n- Run trial batches back-to-back to shorten elapsed time; let teams validate results asynchronously.\n\n- Use your planned group/subgroup structure to define batches and respect API rate limits.\n\n\nRecommended steps:\n\n\n1. Create a test destination in GitLab for trials:\n\n\n  - GitLab.com: create a dedicated group/namespace (for example, my-org-sandbox)\n\n  - Self-managed: create a top-level group or a separate test instance if needed\n\n\n2. Prepare authentication:\n\n\n  - Azure DevOps PAT with required scopes.\n\n  - GitLab Personal Access Token with api and read_repository (plus admin access for file-based imports used by Congregate).\n\n\n3. Run trial migrations:\n\n\n  - Repos only: use GitLab's built-in import (Repo by URL)\n\n  - Repos + PRs/MRs and additional assets: use Congregate\n\n\n4. Post-trial follow-up:\n\n\n  - Verify repo history, branches, tags; merge requests (if migrated), issues/epics (if migrated), labels, and relationships.\n\n  - Check permissions/roles, protected branches, required approvals, runners/tags, variables/secrets, integrations/webhooks.\n\n  - Validate pipelines (`.gitlab-ci.yml`) or converted pipelines where applicable.\n\n\n5. Ask users to validate functionality and data fidelity.\n\n6. Resolve issues uncovered during trials and update your runbooks.\n\n7. Network and security:\n\n\n  - If your destination uses IP allow lists, add the IPs of your migration host and any required runners/integrations so imports can succeed.\n\n\n8. Run production migrations in waves:\n\n\n  - Enforce change freezes in ADO during each wave.\n\n  - Monitor progress and logs; retry or adjust batch sizes if you hit rate limits.\n\n\n9. Optional: remove the sandbox group or archive it after you finish.\n\n\n\u003Cfigure class=\"video_container\">\n  \u003Ciframe src=\"https://www.youtube.com/embed/ibIXGfrVbi4?si=ZxOVnXjCF-h4Ne0N\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"true\">\u003C/iframe>\n\u003C/figure>\n\n\n## Terminology reference for GitLab and Azure DevOps\n\n| GitLab                                                           | Azure DevOps                                 | Similarities & Key Differences                                                                                                                                          |\n| ---------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |\n| Group                                                            | Organization                                 | Top-level namespace, membership, policies. ADO org contains Projects; GitLab Group contains Subgroups and Projects.                                                   |\n| Group or Subgroup                                                | Project                                      | Logical container, permissions boundary. ADO Project holds many repos; GitLab Groups/Subgroups organize many Projects.                                                |\n| Project (includes a Git repo)                                    | Repository (inside a Project)                | Git history, branches, tags. In GitLab, a \"Project\" is the repo plus issues, CI/CD, wiki, etc. One repo per Project.                                                  |\n| Merge Request (MR)                                               | Pull Request (PR)                            | Code review, discussions, approvals. MR rules include approvals, required pipelines, code owners.                                                                     |\n| Protected Branches, MR Approval Rules, Status Checks             | Branch Policies                              | Enforce reviews and checks. GitLab combines protections + approval rules + required status checks.                                                                    |\n| GitLab CI/CD                                                     | Azure Pipelines                              | YAML pipelines, stages/jobs, logs. ADO also has classic UI pipelines; GitLab centers on .gitlab-ci.yml.                                                               |\n| .gitlab-ci.yml                                                   | azure-pipelines.yml                          | Defines stages/jobs/triggers. Syntax/features differ; map jobs, variables, artifacts, and triggers.                                                                   |\n| Runners (shared/specific)                                        | Agents / Agent Pools                         | Execute jobs on machines/containers. Target via demands (ADO) vs tags (GitLab). Registration/scoping differs.                                                         |\n| CI/CD Variables (project/group/instance), Protected/Masked       | Pipeline Variables, Variable Groups, Library | Pass config/secrets to jobs. GitLab supports group inheritance and masking/protection flags.                                                                          |\n| Integrations, CI/CD Variables, Deploy Keys                       | Service Connections                          | External auth to services/clouds. Map to integrations or variables; cloud-specific helpers available.                                                                 |\n| Environments & Deployments (protected envs)                      | Environments (with approvals)                | Track deploy targets/history. Approvals via protected envs and manual jobs in GitLab.                                                                                 |\n| Releases (tag + notes)                                           | Releases (classic or pipelines)              | Versioned notes/artifacts. GitLab Release ties to tags; deployments tracked separately.                                                                               |\n| Job Artifacts                                                    | Pipeline Artifacts                           | Persist job outputs. Retention/expiry configured per job or project.                                                                                                  |\n| Package Registry (NuGet/npm/Maven/PyPI/Composer, etc.)           | Azure Artifacts (NuGet/npm/Maven, etc.)      | Package hosting. Auth/namespace differ; migrate per package type.                                                                                                     |\n| GitLab Container Registry                                        | Azure Container Registry (ACR) or others     | OCI images. GitLab provides per-project/group registries.                                                                                                             |\n| Issue Boards                                                     | Boards                                       | Visualize work by columns. GitLab boards are label-driven; multiple boards per project/group.                                                                         |\n| Issues (types/labels), Epics                                     | Work Items (User Story/Bug/Task)             | Track units of work. Map ADO types/fields to labels/custom fields; epics at group level.                                                                              |\n| Epics, Parent/Child Issues                                       | Epics/Features                               | Hierarchy of work. Schema differs; use epics + issue relationships.                                                                                                   |\n| Milestones and Iterations                                        | Iteration Paths                              | Time-boxing. GitLab Iterations (group feature) or Milestones per project/group.                                                                                       |\n| Labels (scoped labels)                                           | Area Paths                                   | Categorization/ownership. Replace hierarchical areas with scoped labels.                                                                                              |\n| Project/Group Wiki                                               | Project Wiki                                 | Markdown wiki. Backed by repos in both; layout/auth differ slightly.                                                                                                  |\n| Test reports via CI, Requirements/Test Management, integrations  | Test Plans/Cases/Runs                        | QA evidence/traceability. No 1:1 with ADO Test Plans; often use CI reports + issues/requirements.                                                                     |\n| Roles (Owner/Maintainer/Developer/Reporter/Guest) + custom roles | Access levels + granular permissions         | Control read/write/admin. Models differ; leverage group inheritance and protected resources.                                                                          |\n| Webhooks                                                         | Service Hooks                                | Event-driven integrations. Event names/payloads differ; reconfigure endpoints.                                                                                        |\n| Advanced Search                                                  | Code Search                                  | Full-text repo search. Self-managed GitLab may need Elasticsearch/OpenSearch for advanced features.                                                                   |\n","2025-12-03","2026-01-16","https://res.cloudinary.com/about-gitlab-com/image/upload/v1749658924/Blog/Hero%20Images/securitylifecycle-light.png",[737,738],"Evgeny Rudinsky","Michael Leopard","Guide: Migrate from Azure DevOps to GitLab","Learn how to carry out the full migration from Azure DevOps to GitLab using GitLab Professional Services migration tools — from planning and execution to post-migration follow-up tasks.",{"featured":27,"template":13,"slug":742},"migration-from-azure-devops-to-gitlab",{"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":240},"/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",[724,556],"Are you just managing tools or shipping innovation?",{"text":764,"config":765},"Get your DevOps maturity score",{"href":766,"dataGaName":755,"dataGaLocation":240},"/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":240},"/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":47,"dataGaLocation":789},"https://gitlab.com/-/trial_registrations/new?glm_content=default-saas-trial&glm_source=about.gitlab.com/","feature",{"text":492,"config":791},{"href":51,"dataGaName":52,"dataGaLocation":789},1772652082488]