renovate/docs/self-hosting.md

Self-Hosting Renovate

Although Renovate is now best known as a "service" via the GitHub App, that service is actually running this same open source project, so you can get the same functionality if running it yourself. The version you see here in this repository can be cloned or npm installed in seconds and give you the exact same functionality as in the app.

Install

$ npm install -g renovate

Authentication

You need to select a repository user for renovate to assume the identity of, and generate a Personal Access Token. It's strongly recommended that you use a dedicated "bot" account for this to avoid user confusion and to avoid the Renovate bot mistaking changes you have made or PRs you have raised for its own.

You can find instructions for GitHub here (select "repo" permissions)

You can find instructions for GitLab here. Note: GitLab APIv3 is no longer supported - please upgrade to GitLab APIv4 before testing Renovate.

You can find instructions for VSTS vsts.

This token needs to be configured via file, environment variable, or CLI. See docs/configuration.md for details. The simplest way is to expose it as GITHUB_TOKEN or GITLAB_TOKEN or VSTS_TOKEN.

Usage

Run renovate --help for usage details.

Note: The first time you run renovate on a repository, it will not upgrade any dependencies. Instead, it will create a Pull Request (Merge Request if GitLab) called 'Configure Renovate' and commit a default renovate.json file to the repository. This PR can be close unmerged if the default settings are fine for you. Also, this behaviour can be disabled if you set the onboarding configuration option to false before running.

Deployment

See deployment docs for details.