#FAQ

#glab

labdash does not need glab and does not use it. It calls GitLab's GraphQL and REST endpoints directly and spawns no subprocess.

It also reads and writes nothing that belongs to glab: not the configuration file, not the keyring entries, not the token. See labdash and glab.

#Self-managed GitLab

Supported directly. A private certificate authority, client certificates, a proxy, a subfolder install, custom headers and per-instance credentials are all settings on an instance. See self-managed GitLab.

OAuth needs an application registered on that instance. Without one, log in with a personal access token, which lasts up to 365 days against the two hours an OAuth access token lasts.

#Windows

labdash is developed on Windows, and Windows Terminal is the first terminal checked. Resize, mouse, Unicode and key handling are verified there. See terminal support.

#Repository access

labdash never requests the write_repository scope. It asks for api and read_user, or read_api and read_user in read-only mode.

It checks out a branch in a local clone you have mapped in repoPaths, and refuses when the working tree is dirty. It never pushes. See security.

#Telemetry

labdash talks to your GitLab and to nothing else. There is no telemetry, no analytics and no crash-reporting service.

The version check is one cached request that never blocks startup, and updateCheck: false turns it off.

This documentation site is separate. It can count page views with Google Analytics, and it asks you first. Reject is the same one click as Accept, and the footer's Cookies link changes your answer later. See privacy.

#Minimum GitLab version

GitLab 16.0 for the core. Some features need more:

labdash asks your instance which version it runs. Where a field is unavailable, that column degrades and the section keeps working.

#Read-only mode

A read_api token is a supported mode. It gets you every section, every filter, every column and every log. The mutating keys are removed from the footer and from help, and a badge in the context bar says why. See read-only mode.

#GitHub

labdash covers GitLab. For GitHub, gh-dash is the equivalent dashboard, and its concepts map across closely. See coming from gh-dash.

#Other GitLab terminal tools

rcieri/glab-tui is a repository browser with side-by-side diffs and inline review comments. labdash works a level up, on the queue across projects, and shows no file diffs. The two run side by side. See other GitLab TUIs.

#Fonts

No patched font is needed. labdash draws status with ordinary Unicode glyphs, and every one has a single-character ASCII fallback, so a screen rendered in ASCII mode has identical column boundaries.

theme: { icons: ascii } forces the fallback everywhere.

#Request volume

Each section is one query. Sections carry independent refresh intervals, so a "merged this quarter" archive polls hourly while "Running" polls every 20 seconds. A busy dashboard sits well inside gitlab.com's per-user rate budget. See refresh and caching.

#Load time

Section queries take seconds on GitLab's API. labdash fetches every section concurrently and paints the first frame from cache, so the previous rows stay on screen while the new ones arrive. See refresh and caching.

#CI and scripting

You can authenticate in CI. The device flow works inside a container, and labdash auth login --with-token reads a token from standard input.

The dashboard itself is interactive. For a script, labdash export <view> --json emits a pinned view's rows as JSON. See pipe a view into jq.

#The name

"GitLab dashboard".

The mascot is a tanuki, a Japanese raccoon dog, which is what GitLab's own logo is. labdash draws its own and uses none of GitLab's marks or brand colours.

#Affiliation

labdash is an independent open-source project. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by GitLab Inc.