awesome-copilot/skills/vcpkg/references/ci.md

vcpkg: CI/CD & DevOps

Reference for the vcpkg skill. Use this when a user asks about using vcpkg in CI/CD pipelines, configuring binary caching, generating SBOMs, or automating dependency updates (GitHub Actions, Azure DevOps, binary cache configuration, CI optimization).

Binary Caching

Configure binary caching to avoid rebuilding packages:

Azure Blob Storage:

$env:VCPKG_BINARY_SOURCES = "clear;x-azblob,https://myaccount.blob.core.windows.net/vcpkg-cache,$env:AZURE_STORAGE_SAS_TOKEN,readwrite"

export VCPKG_BINARY_SOURCES="clear;x-azblob,https://myaccount.blob.core.windows.net/vcpkg-cache,$AZURE_STORAGE_SAS_TOKEN,readwrite"

GitHub Packages (NuGet):

$env:VCPKG_BINARY_SOURCES = "clear;nuget,https://nuget.pkg.github.com/your-org/index.json,readwrite"

export VCPKG_BINARY_SOURCES="clear;nuget,https://nuget.pkg.github.com/your-org/index.json,readwrite"

For GitHub Packages, also configure NuGet authentication (for example via GITHUB_TOKEN in CI or a PAT/credential provider for local development). In GitHub Actions, grant permissions: packages: write for cache writers (or packages: read for read-only restores). Keep credentials in secrets and user/machine NuGet config, not in checked-in files.

CI-friendly (cross-platform) GitHub Actions pattern:

permissions:
  contents: read
  packages: write

env:
  VCPKG_BINARY_SOURCES: clear;nuget,https://nuget.pkg.github.com/your-org/index.json,readwrite

Use repository/org secrets for NuGet auth rather than storing credentials in the repository.

Local filesystem:

$env:VCPKG_BINARY_SOURCES = "clear;files,C:\vcpkg-cache,readwrite"

export VCPKG_BINARY_SOURCES="clear;files,/var/tmp/vcpkg-cache,readwrite"

Sharing between CI and local dev: Use the same remote cache source in both environments and switch only the final mode token: CI uses readwrite, developers use read.

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Generating an SBOM (Software Bill of Materials)

vcpkg emits per-port SPDX SBOM files during normal source builds; no special SBOM flag is required.

vcpkg install

Each installed port writes:

<installed-root>/<triplet>/share/<port>/vcpkg.spdx.json

<installed-root> depends on integration mode:

• CLI manifest mode: <manifest-root>/vcpkg_installed
• CMake integration (default): ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/vcpkg_installed (or VCPKG_INSTALLED_DIR if overridden)
• MSBuild integration (default): $(VcpkgManifestRoot)\vcpkg_installed (or $(VcpkgInstalledDir) if overridden)

If you need a single consolidated SBOM, enumerate installed ports with vcpkg list and merge/transform their per-port SPDX files in your SBOM pipeline.

---

Automating Dependency Updates

Option 1: Dependabot (GitHub) — configure .github/dependabot.yml:

version: 2
updates:
  - package-ecosystem: "vcpkg"
    directory: "/"
    schedule:
      interval: "weekly"

Option 2: Script-based — create a scheduled CI job that:

1. Updates the vcpkg clone (git pull)
2. Gets the new baseline (git rev-parse HEAD)
3. Updates builtin-baseline in vcpkg.json
4. Runs vcpkg install to verify
5. Opens a PR with the changes

---

Multi-Triplet CI Testing

Test across multiple triplets with this job-definition fragment nested under jobs.<job-id> in a GitHub Actions workflow:

runs-on: ${{ matrix.os }}
strategy:
  matrix:
    triplet: [x64-windows, x64-linux, x64-osx]
    include:
      - triplet: x64-windows
        os: windows-latest
      - triplet: x64-linux
        os: ubuntu-latest
      - triplet: x64-osx
        os: macos-latest

steps:
  - uses: actions/checkout@v4
  - name: Clone vcpkg
    run: git clone https://github.com/microsoft/vcpkg
  - name: Bootstrap vcpkg (Windows)
    if: runner.os == 'Windows'
    shell: pwsh
    run: .\vcpkg\bootstrap-vcpkg.bat
  - name: Bootstrap vcpkg (Linux/macOS)
    if: runner.os != 'Windows'
    run: ./vcpkg/bootstrap-vcpkg.sh
  - name: Install dependencies (Windows)
    if: runner.os == 'Windows'
    shell: pwsh
    run: .\vcpkg\vcpkg.exe install --triplet ${{ matrix.triplet }}
  - name: Install dependencies (Linux/macOS)
    if: runner.os != 'Windows'
    run: ./vcpkg/vcpkg install --triplet ${{ matrix.triplet }}