DevOps / GitLab CI Basics Interview Questions

What are GitLab CI/CD variables and what types are available?

CI/CD variables are key-value pairs that make values available to jobs. They are used to configure jobs without hardcoding values, store secrets safely, and pass information between pipeline components.

Variable types
Type	Where defined	Use case
Predefined variables	Set automatically by GitLab	Pipeline metadata: $CI_COMMIT_SHA, $CI_COMMIT_BRANCH
Project variables	Settings > CI/CD > Variables	Project-specific secrets: API keys, passwords
Group variables	Group > Settings > CI/CD > Variables	Shared secrets across projects in a group
Instance variables	Admin area > CI/CD > Variables	Shared across the entire GitLab instance
.gitlab-ci.yml variables	variables: keyword in YAML	Non-secret config values

# Defining variables in .gitlab-ci.yml
variables:
  DATABASE_URL: "postgres://localhost/mydb"  # available to all jobs
  DEPLOY_ENV: "staging"

build-job:
  variables:
    NODE_ENV: "production"   # job-level variable (overrides global)
  script:
    - echo "Branch: $CI_COMMIT_BRANCH"
    - echo "Commit: $CI_COMMIT_SHA"
    - echo "DB: $DATABASE_URL"
    - echo "Node env: $NODE_ENV"

Security settings for project/group variables:

Masked - value is hidden in job logs (must be a single line, no spaces)
Protected - variable only available to jobs running on protected branches or tags
Expanded - controls whether $VAR references within the value are expanded

Take quiz

What does marking a GitLab CI variable as 'Masked' do?Prevents the variable from being overridden in jobs

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Hides the variable value in job logs so it cannot be read from log output

✓ Correct! Well done.

Restricts the variable to protected branches only

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Encrypts the variable at rest in the GitLab database

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What is a 'predefined variable' in GitLab CI/CD?A variable you define in .gitlab-ci.yml

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A variable GitLab automatically sets with pipeline metadata like $CI_COMMIT_SHA and $CI_COMMIT_BRANCH

✓ Correct! Well done.

A variable only available in the deploy stage

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A variable that must be explicitly passed to each job

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More Related questions...

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DevOps / GitLab CI Basics Interview Questions

What are GitLab CI/CD variables and what types are available?

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