Connecting GitLab

Drumroll syncs GitLab Releases into your changelog. Each release on the project becomes one entry - title from the release name, body rendered from the release description, dated to the release's released_at. OAuth-authorized, on-demand sync, no polling.

Step 1 - Authorize GitLab

From your workspace integrations page, click Connect GitLab. You'll be redirected to gitlab.com to authorize Drumroll. We request the minimum needed scopes:

• read_api - list and read releases on the project you pick.
• read_repository - resolve project metadata.

Tokens are AES-256-GCM encrypted at rest before they ever touch our database. Refresh tokens are rotated transparently every ~2 hours, so the connection just stays connected. Disconnect any time - tokens are deleted immediately.

Step 2 - Pick a project

After authorizing, you'll see a single text input: Project. Type the project's full path:

• Top-level: acme-co/changelog
• Nested namespace: acme-co/platform-team/changelog

Drumroll resolves the path to a numeric project ID once and caches both, so future syncs skip the lookup. The path must be a project your authorizing GitLab account can read.

Step 3 - Sync on demand

Click Sync now. Drumroll lists every release on the project via the GitLab Releases API and creates one changelog entry per release:

• Title - the release name (or the tag if no name was set).
• Body - the release description, rendered from GitLab markdown to HTML.
• Date - the release's released_at timestamp.
• Status - published by default. Releases with a future released_at (GitLab's upcoming release flag) come in as drafts.
• Tags - the entry is tagged release so you can filter it later.

Re-syncs are safe. Drumroll dedupes by project_path:tag_name, so the same release won't be inserted twice. Edits to the release on GitLab (title, description, date) are reflected in the entry on the next sync.

How re-syncs behave

The dedupe key is the project path + tag name. That means:

• Renaming a release on GitLab updates the existing entry in Drumroll - no duplicate.
• Deleting a release on GitLab leaves the Drumroll entry in place - we never destructively delete your changelog history.
• Moving a project (changing its group/repo path on GitLab) will create new entries on the next sync. Update the project path in Drumroll first to avoid that.

Limits and constraints

• gitlab.com only for v1. Self-managed GitLab instances aren't supported yet.
• Releases only. Issues, MRs, milestones, and CI artifacts aren't synced.
• No automatic polling. Syncs are user-triggered from the integrations page.

Disconnecting

Click Disconnect GitLab on the integrations page. Access + refresh tokens are deleted immediately. Synced entries stay - they become regular entries you can edit or delete.