Templates

Template expansion allows you to use dynamic values in your job configuration files. Fields that support templating can reference variables using the ${VAR} syntax.

Syntax

Templates use shell-style variable expansion:

• ${VAR} - Expands to the value of VAR
• $VAR - Also valid, but braces are recommended for clarity

If a referenced variable is not defined, the job will fail with an error.

Built-in Variables

The following variables are always available:

Variable	Description	Example
JOB_NAME	The job name from metadata.name	my-collection-job
JOB_DATE_ISO8601	Current UTC timestamp in ISO8601 basic format (URL-safe)	20240115T143052Z
JOB_DATE_RFC3339	Current UTC timestamp in RFC3339 format	2024-01-15T14:30:52Z

Environment Variables

Additional environment variables can be made available using the --pass-env flag:

infracollect collect job.yaml --pass-env AWS_REGION --pass-env ENVIRONMENT

Only explicitly passed environment variables can be referenced. If a passed variable is not set in the environment, the job will fail.

To pass all environment variables (use with caution in trusted environments):

infracollect collect job.yaml --pass-all-env

Example

apiVersion: v1
kind: CollectJob
metadata:
  name: daily-backup

spec:
  collectors:
    - id: api
      http:
        base_url: https://api.example.com
        auth:
          basic:
            username: ${API_USER}
            password: ${API_PASSWORD}

  steps:
    - id: data
      collector: api
      http_get:
        path: /export

  output:
    sink:
      s3:
        bucket: my-backups
        prefix: ${JOB_NAME}/${JOB_DATE_ISO8601}/

Run with:

infracollect collect job.yaml --pass-env API_USER --pass-env API_PASSWORD

Supported Fields

Not all fields support template expansion. Fields that support templates are marked with a Template badge in the reference documentation. Generally, string fields that accept user-provided values (paths, URLs, credentials, prefixes) support templating.

The following field types are expanded:

• String fields marked with the template tag
• All values in map[string]string fields (e.g., headers, params)
• All elements in []string (string array) fields marked with the template tag (e.g., program)

Array Templating Example

String arrays support per-element template expansion. For example, in an exec step:

steps:
  - id: run-script
    exec:
      program:
        - /bin/bash
        - -c
        - echo "Job ${JOB_NAME} running in ${ENVIRONMENT}"

Each element in the program array is expanded independently, allowing you to use variables in command arguments.