Environment Variable with _FILE suffix throws Exception - Using Directus as a service in GitLab CI/CD

[RANSoftRA]

Describe the Bug

When running a GitLab CI/CD Pipeline, the runner contains a lot of environemt variables: https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/ci/variables/predefined_variables.html.

On of those is: CI_SERVER_TLS_CA_FILE

Directus behavior is to read the file contents if the key ends with _FILE:

• directus/api/src/env.ts

  Line 221 in c30b041

  function processValues(env: Record<string, any>) {

In our case this behavior raises a serious problem, because we cannot alter the variable in GitLab (otherwise the job would fail at a different place).

Generally speaking, this behavior is kind of stange, since a enviroment variable that is not managed by directus can contain arbitrary information.

For example: What happens if I set the environment variable TEST_FILE to a huge file.

To Reproduce

In our case - GitLab Configuration:

• Assuming a working GitLab instance with CI/CD available
• .gitlab-ci.yml:

image: openjdk:17.0-jdk-bullseye

services:
  - name: postgres:14
    alias: postgres
  - name: directus/directus:9
    alias: directus
variables:
  POSTGRES_DB: db
  POSTGRES_USER: db
  POSTGRES_PASSWORD: db
  KEY: somekey
  SECRET: somesecret
  DB_CLIENT: pg
  DB_HOST: postgres
  DB_PORT: 5432
  DB_DATABASE: db
  DB_USER: db
  DB_PASSWORD: db
  ADMIN_EMAIL: 'directus@test.at'
  ADMIN_PASSWORD: 'db'

Errors Shown

�[0;33m*** WARNING:�[0;m Service runner-75vys7d1-project-96-concurrent-0-ac8237f753d63b8a-directus__directus-1 probably didn't start properly.

Health check error:
start service container: Error response from daemon: Cannot link to a non running container: /runner-75vys7d1-project-96-concurrent-0-ac8237f753d63b8a-directus__directus-1 AS /runner-75vys7d1-project-96-concurrent-0-ac8237f753d63b8a-directus__directus-1-wait-for-service/service (docker.go:1153:1s)

Service container logs:
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886940797Z /directus/node_modules/directus/dist/env.js:190
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886961697Z throw new Error(Failed to read value from file "${value}", defined in environment variable "${key}".);
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886965574Z ^
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886967868Z
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886970022Z Error: Failed to read value from file "-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886972327Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886974541Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886976715Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886978879Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886981103Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886983417Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886985582Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886987726Z THE WHOLE CERTIFICATE CHAIN**
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886989910Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886992094Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886994288Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886996442Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.886998636Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887000780Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887002944Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887005178Z ****************************************************************
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887175700Z -----END CERTIFICATE-----", defined in environment variable "CI_SERVER_TLS_CA_FILE".
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887178134Z at processValues (/directus/node_modules/directus/dist/env.js:190:23)
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887180389Z at Object. (/directus/node_modules/directus/dist/env.js:96:7)
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887183274Z at Module._compile (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1105:14)
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887185789Z at Object.Module._extensions..js (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1159:10)
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887188083Z at Module.load (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:981:32)
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887190267Z at Function.Module._load (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:822:12)
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887192501Z at Module.require (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1005:19)
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887194716Z at require (node:internal/modules/cjs/helpers:102:18)
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887196890Z at Object. (/directus/node_modules/directus/dist/cache.js:9:31)
2022-05-13T09:34:55.887199234Z at Module._compile (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1105:14)

What version of Directus are you using?

9.10.0

What version of Node.js are you using?

Use of Docker Image directus/directus:9

What database are you using?

Postgres 14

What browser are you using?

none - ci/cd pipeline

How are you deploying Directus?

Docker