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Introduction
In today’s fast‑paced DevOps world, every team builds its own custom scripts to enforce governance and compliance across CI/CD pipelines—leading to duplicated effort, inconsistent controls, and hidden security gaps. Plumber‑CLI, a fresh open‑source initiative (⭐ ~300 stars, 1,500+ clones), offers a unified, community‑driven approach to validate repository structure, pipeline definitions, and security best practices. By centralising these checks, it empowers developers, SREs, and platform engineers to shift left on compliance without reinventing the wheel.
Learning Objectives
- Grasp the critical need for automated CI/CD governance and how Plumber‑CLI addresses it.
- Install and configure Plumber‑CLI across different operating systems and environments.
- Run predefined checks and interpret their output to harden your pipelines.
- Integrate Plumber‑CLI seamlessly into popular CI/CD platforms (GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Jenkins).
- Extend the tool with custom controls and contribute to its growing rule library.
You Should Know
1. What is Plumber-CLI and Why It Matters?
Plumber‑CLI is a lightweight, open‑source command‑line tool designed to audit your CI/CD pipelines and repositories against a set of configurable rules. It helps answer questions like:
– Are all pipeline definitions stored in the correct location?
– Do our GitHub Actions workflows use pinned versions of third‑party actions?
– Are secrets accidentally exposed in pipeline logs or configuration files?
– Do our Dockerfiles follow security best practices?
Instead of every organisation writing its own compliance scripts, Plumber‑CLI provides a shared library of checks that evolve with community feedback. This not only saves time but also ensures that your pipelines align with emerging industry standards.
2. Installing Plumber-CLI
Plumber‑CLI is distributed as a single binary, making installation straightforward on any platform.
Linux / macOS (using curl)
Download the latest binary (adjust the URL according to the actual release) curl -LO https://github.com/plumber-cli/plumber/releases/latest/download/plumber-linux-amd64 chmod +x plumber-linux-amd64 sudo mv plumber-linux-amd64 /usr/local/bin/plumber
Windows (PowerShell)
Download the Windows executable Invoke-WebRequest -Uri "https://github.com/plumber-cli/plumber/releases/latest/download/plumber-windows-amd64.exe" -OutFile "plumber.exe" Move it to a directory in your PATH, e.g., C:\Windows\System32
Using Docker
docker pull ghcr.io/plumber-cli/plumber:latest docker run --rm -v $(pwd):/workspace ghcr.io/plumber-cli/plumber check /workspace
Verify installation
plumber --version
3. Configuring Plumber-CLI for Your Repositories
Plumber‑CLI uses a YAML configuration file (.plumber.yml or plumber.config.yml) placed at the root of your repository. This file defines which checks to run and any custom rules.
Example `.plumber.yml`
Enable or disable specific rule categories checks: - pipeline-security - secret-scanning - docker-best-practices - repo-structure Customise rule parameters rules: pipeline-security: require-pinned-actions: true max-job-timeout: 3600 seconds secret-scanning: exclude-paths: - "test/fixtures/" - ".md"
You can also define entirely new checks using a simple DSL (see section 6).
4. Running Plumber-CLI Checks
Once configured, run the tool against your repository:
plumber check .
The output is colour‑coded and includes a summary of passed, failed, and skipped checks. For a more detailed report in JSON format (useful for CI integration):
plumber check . --format json > report.json
Example output snippet
✔ Repository structure: Found expected folders (.github/workflows, docker) ✔ GitHub Actions: All third-party actions are pinned to a commit hash ✘ Secret scanning: Possible AWS key detected in deploy.sh: line 23 ✔ Dockerfile: No root user specified, good practice
Failed checks will exit with a non‑zero code, making it easy to block a pipeline step.
5. Integrating Plumber-CLI into CI/CD Pipelines
GitHub Actions – Add a step to your workflow:
name: CI/CD Compliance on: [push, pull_request] jobs: compliance: runs-on: ubuntu-latest steps: - uses: actions/checkout@v4 - name: Run Plumber-CLI uses: docker://ghcr.io/plumber-cli/plumber:latest with: args: check .
GitLab CI – In `.gitlab-ci.yml`:
compliance: image: ghcr.io/plumber-cli/plumber:latest script: - plumber check . only: - merge_requests
Jenkins Pipeline – Use a Docker agent:
pipeline {
agent { docker { image 'ghcr.io/plumber-cli/plumber:latest' } }
stages {
stage('Compliance Check') {
steps {
sh 'plumber check .'
}
}
}
}
6. Extending Plumber-CLI with Custom Controls
The real power of Plumber‑CLI lies in its extensibility. You can write custom checks in a simple YAML format and even contribute them back to the community.
Create a file `custom-checks.yml`:
checks: - id: "CUSTOM001" name: "No hardcoded passwords in Terraform" description: "Ensure Terraform files do not contain plain-text passwords." match: pattern: "password\s=\s[\"'][^\"']+[\"']" exclude: - ".tfvars.example" severity: "high" remediation: "Use a secrets manager or environment variables."
Then reference it in your `.plumber.yml`:
custom-checks: - "custom-checks.yml"
To contribute, fork the Plumber‑CLI GitHub repo, add your check to the community library, and open a pull request.
7. Best Practices for CI/CD Security and Compliance
While Plumber‑CLI automates many checks, a holistic approach to pipeline security includes:
- Principle of least privilege for CI/CD service accounts.
- Signed commits and mandatory code reviews.
- Regular rotation of secrets and use of dedicated secrets management (HashiCorp Vault, AWS Secrets Manager).
- Immutable infrastructure – never modify running containers; rebuild from scratch.
- Continuous monitoring of pipeline logs for anomalies.
Plumber‑CLI can be extended to enforce many of these practices, but it should complement—not replace—a well‑designed security culture.
What Undercode Say
- Key Takeaway 1: By adopting Plumber‑CLI, organisations eliminate redundant compliance scripts and benefit from a living library of controls that evolves with the threat landscape.
- Key Takeaway 2: Open‑source collaboration on pipeline governance accelerates the creation of industry‑wide standards, making security a shared responsibility rather than a siloed burden.
Plumber‑CLI represents a shift from fragmented, in‑house solutions to a unified, community‑backed tool that can dramatically reduce the attack surface of CI/CD pipelines. Its lightweight design and extensibility make it accessible for startups and enterprises alike. As more contributors join, the rule set will only become richer, covering everything from cloud misconfigurations to software supply chain attacks. The project’s French origins highlight the global nature of DevSecOps innovation. Embracing such tools today positions teams to proactively address tomorrow’s compliance demands.
Prediction
In the next 12–18 months, we will see a surge in supply‑chain attacks targeting misconfigured CI/CD pipelines—just as we witnessed with SolarWinds and Codecov. Tools like Plumber‑CLI will become indispensable components of the DevSecOps stack, likely integrating with broader security platforms (e.g., DefectDojo, ARMO). As the community grows, Plumber‑CLI could evolve into a de facto standard for pipeline compliance, eventually being adopted by regulatory frameworks as a recommended control. The move toward “compliance as code” is inevitable, and Plumber‑CLI is poised to lead that charge.
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