GitLabBar

Note: This is an experimental project for personal use. If it helps someone else, great! No guarantees are provided regarding stability or maintenance. The application may change at any time without backward compatibility.

A macOS menu bar application for tracking GitLab merge requests, pipelines, and releases at a glance.

Features

Menu Bar Icon

GitLabBar lives in your macOS menu bar with a color-coded icon that reflects your current status:

Icon Color	Meaning
Red	At least one pipeline has failed
Orange	Pipelines are currently running
Green	Everything is fine, MRs or pipelines are present
Gray	No data or no active account

The icon status only considers visible items. If you dismiss a failed pipeline, the icon will update accordingly.

Merge Requests

Track all your merge requests organized by category:

• To review: MRs where you are assigned as a reviewer
• Assigned: MRs assigned to you
• Created by me: MRs you authored
• No reviewer: MRs from watched projects that have no reviewer assigned (optional)

Each MR displays:

• Author avatar, name and username
• Project path and MR number
• Source branch → Target branch with visual distinction
• Draft badge for work-in-progress MRs
• Conflicts badge when merge conflicts exist
• Assignees avatars
• Reviewers avatars
• Time since creation

Pipelines

Monitor your CI/CD pipelines in real-time:

• Running/Pending: Active pipelines with current stage information
• Failed: Recent failed pipelines (configurable time window)

Each pipeline shows:

• Project path and branch name (with git icon)
• Current status (Running, Failed, Success, Pending, Canceled)
• Pipeline source (Push, Web, API, MR, Schedule, Trigger...)
• Triggered by: Avatar and name of who triggered the pipeline
• Individual job statuses grouped by stage

Releases

Track releases from your watched projects:

• Release tag and name
• Release date
• Deployment status (if configured)
• Environment information

Dismiss & Restore

You can dismiss any item (MR, pipeline, or release) to hide it temporarily:

1. Click the × button on any item to dismiss it
2. The item will be hidden from the list
3. A counter shows how many items are hidden (e.g., "2 hidden")
4. Click Show all to restore all dismissed items

Important: Dismissed items are excluded from the tray icon status calculation. For example, if you dismiss all failed pipelines, the icon will no longer be red.

Resizable Window

The popup window can be resized by dragging its edges. Your preferred size is automatically saved and restored on next launch.

Multi-Account Support

Connect multiple GitLab accounts from different instances:

• GitLab.com
• Self-hosted GitLab instances
• Enable/disable accounts individually

Watched Projects

Select specific projects to monitor for:

• Pipelines (including failed ones)
• Releases and deployments
• Unassigned merge requests

Notifications

Receive native macOS notifications for:

• New MR assigned to you
• Mentioned in an MR
• Pipeline started
• Pipeline failed
• Pipeline succeeded

All notification types can be individually enabled/disabled.

General Settings

• Refresh interval: 30 seconds to 10 minutes
• Failed pipeline age limit: Only show failures from the last X hours
• Launch at startup: Start GitLabBar when you log in
• Dark mode: Automatically adapts to your macOS appearance

Installation

Quick Install (one-liner)

Fresh install:

curl -sL "$(curl -s https://api.github.com/repos/yoanbernabeu/GitLabBar/releases/latest | grep browser_download_url | grep '\.zip' | cut -d '"' -f 4)" -o /tmp/GitLabBar.zip && unzip -qo /tmp/GitLabBar.zip -d /Applications && xattr -cr /Applications/GitLabBar.app && rm /tmp/GitLabBar.zip && echo "GitLabBar installed!"

Upgrade (replace an existing version):

osascript -e 'quit app "GitLabBar"' 2>/dev/null; rm -rf /Applications/GitLabBar.app && curl -sL "$(curl -s https://api.github.com/repos/yoanbernabeu/GitLabBar/releases/latest | grep browser_download_url | grep '\.zip' | cut -d '"' -f 4)" -o /tmp/GitLabBar.zip && unzip -qo /tmp/GitLabBar.zip -d /Applications && xattr -cr /Applications/GitLabBar.app && rm /tmp/GitLabBar.zip && echo "GitLabBar upgraded!"

Your configuration (accounts, watched projects, settings) is preserved across upgrades.

From Releases (manual)

1. Download the latest .dmg file from the Releases page
2. Open the .dmg file
3. Drag GitLabBar to your Applications folder
4. Launch GitLabBar from Applications

Bypassing macOS Gatekeeper

Since GitLabBar is not signed with an Apple Developer certificate, macOS will block the app on first launch. The one-liner commands above handle this automatically via xattr -cr. If you installed manually, here's how to allow it:

Method 1: Right-click to Open (Simplest)

1. Right-click (or Control-click) on GitLabBar in your Applications folder
2. Select Open from the context menu
3. Click Open in the dialog that appears
4. GitLabBar will now be allowed to run

Method 2: System Preferences

1. Try to open GitLabBar normally (it will be blocked)
2. Go to System Preferences → Security & Privacy → General
3. You'll see a message about GitLabBar being blocked
4. Click Open Anyway
5. Click Open in the confirmation dialog

Method 3: Terminal Command

Remove the quarantine attribute from the app:

xattr -cr /Applications/GitLabBar.app

Then open GitLabBar normally.

Building from Source

Prerequisites

• Node.js 18 or later
• npm 9 or later
• macOS (for building the macOS app)

Steps

1. Clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/yoanbernabeu/GitLabBar.git
cd GitLabBar

2. Install dependencies:

npm install

3. Run in development mode:

npm start

4. Build the application:

npm run make

The built application will be available in the out/make directory.

Configuration

Adding a GitLab Account

1. Click the GitLabBar icon in your menu bar
2. Click Preferences at the bottom of the popup
3. Go to the Accounts tab
4. Click Add account
5. Enter your GitLab instance URL (e.g., https://gitlab.com or your self-hosted URL)
6. Enter your Personal Access Token
7. Click Validate token to verify the connection
8. Give your account a name and click Add account

Creating a Personal Access Token

1. Go to your GitLab instance → Settings → Access Tokens
2. Create a new token with the following scopes:
   • read_api - Read access to the API
   • read_user - Read access to your user profile
3. Copy the token and paste it in GitLabBar

Setting Up Watched Projects

1. Go to Preferences → Projects
2. Search for projects by name
3. Check the projects you want to monitor
4. These projects will be used for:
   • Tracking failed pipelines
   • Showing releases
   • Displaying unassigned MRs (if enabled)

Tech Stack

• Electron - Cross-platform desktop app framework
• React - UI library
• TypeScript - Type-safe JavaScript
• Vite - Fast build tool
• Electron Forge - Electron tooling

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

Author

Yoan Bernabeu - GitHub