deploy-skipper 0.0.1

A CLI utility to detect if a project requires a deployment based on a .deployignore file

Deploy Skipper 🚀

Smart, zero-dependency deployment gating for your CI/CD pipeline. Stop deploying when nothing meaningful changed — save time, reduce errors, and speed up your workflow.

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Why Deploy Skipper?

Imagine running a deployment every time any file changes, even trivial docs or images. Wasted time, wasted resources, and unnecessary production churn.

Deploy Skipper intelligently decides whether a deployment is necessary by checking your changed files against blacklist & whitelist rules, giving you full control over what triggers your CI/CD.

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Features

• ✅ Blacklist + Whitelist Support Ignore irrelevant files (*.md, images/*) while explicitly allowing critical ones (config/settings.yaml).

• ✅ Git-Aware Automatically diffs against commits, branches, or the most recent tag.

• ✅ Recursive & Flexible Globs Supports *, **, and directory patterns (dir/*) out-of-the-box.

• ✅ Zero Dependencies Pure Python 3 — no external libraries required.

• ✅ Verbose & JSON Modes See exactly which files matched patterns and whether they will trigger a deploy.

• ✅ CI/CD Friendly Exit codes map perfectly to CI logic:

  • 0 → deploy (relevant changes found)
  • 1 → skip (only ignored changes)
  • 2 → error/misconfiguration

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Installation

Option 1: Standalone script

curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/philsupertramp/deploy_skipper/main/deploy_skipper.py
chmod +x deploy_skipper.py
./deploy_skipper.py

Optionally, you can also build the executable yourself

curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/philsupertramp/deploy_skipper/main/deploy_skipper.py
python -m venv
. venv/bin/activate
pip install pyinstaller
pyinstaller --onefile deploy_skipper.py

# this builds into ./dist
./dist/deploy_skipper --help

Option 2: Install via pip (recommended)

pip install deploy_skipper
deploy_skipper

Once installed, the deploy_skipper command is available.

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Usage

# Diff against previous commit
deploy_skipper

# Diff against the most recent tag
deploy_skipper --tag

# Diff against a specific commit
deploy_skipper --ref 3f4e2a1

# Use a custom ignore file
deploy_skipper --ignore-file .mydeployignore

# See verbose output of what triggered the deploy
deploy_skipper --verbose

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.deployignore Format

• Blacklist patterns (ignored files) – default: lines without !
• Whitelist patterns (un-ignore files) – prefix lines with !

# Ignore all markdown files
*.md

# Ignore images
images/*

# Ignore everything in build/ but allow a critical config
build/*
!build/config.json

# Ignore all JS but allow main.js
src/**/*.js
!src/main.js

Whitelist always wins. Even if a file matches a blacklist pattern, if it’s in the whitelist, it will trigger a deploy.

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Examples

Skip deployment for docs-only changes

# .deployignore
*.md
docs/*

# Git changes
git diff HEAD~1 --name-only
README.md
docs/setup.md

deploy_skipper --verbose
# Output:
# README.md: matched blacklist pattern '*.md' -> IGNORED
# docs/setup.md: matched blacklist pattern 'docs/*' -> IGNORED
# All changes are ignored by blacklist/whitelist rules; skipping deployment.

✅ Result: CI/CD skips deploy, saving time.

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Trigger deployment for config changes

# .deployignore
*.md
!config/settings.yaml

# Git changes
git diff HEAD~1 --name-only
README.md
config/settings.yaml

deploy_skipper --verbose
# Output:
# README.md: matched blacklist pattern '*.md' -> IGNORED
# config/settings.yaml: matched whitelist pattern 'config/settings.yaml' -> RELEVANT
# Relevant changes detected, proceeding with deployment:
#   config/settings.yaml

✅ Result: CI/CD triggers deploy, as intended.

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Integration Tips

• GitHub Actions / GitLab CI / Jenkins Use the exit code directly:

  - name: Check if deployment is needed
    run: deploy_skipper
  

• Dry run for debugging (verbose output shows exactly what is happening)

• Combine with caching & notifications for maximum CI efficiency

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Why You’ll Love It

• Save hours of unnecessary deployments
• Reduce deployment-related errors
• Full control over what changes actually matter
• Transparent & easy-to-read logs
• Works on any platform with Python 3

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Contribute

We welcome PRs, suggestions, or improvements!

• Add support for JSON output for machine-readable CI logs
• Improve pattern matching rules for edge cases
• Add integration templates for popular CI/CD systems

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License

MIT License – use freely in personal or commercial projects.