zephyr provider

A zephyr stage manages a West workspace (Zephyr RTOS).

[my-zephyr-stage]
provider = "zephyr"

(provider:/description:/disabled:/depends-on:/scripts:/env:/env-prepend:/env-append: are generic keys every stage has — see “Generic stage keys” in Configuration. Everything below is specific to zephyr.)

Requires

west must be installed wherever this stage runs — denver never installs it. In practice an earlier uv stage provides it, by listing west in its requirements:.

Key reference

  • topdir — WEST_TOPDIR (a zephyr concept, not a denver built-in), set explicitly. Wins outright over everything else, and is exported as WEST_TOPDIR (overwriting an already-exported value) so every ${WEST_TOPDIR} substitution elsewhere in this env agrees with it. Without it, WEST_TOPDIR falls back to an already-exported WEST_TOPDIR env var (e.g. set by the user, or by an outer denver run before re-invoking inside docker), else discovery: walking up from the env dir for the nearest enclosing .west, or failing that, the outermost enclosing .git.

  • exe (default: "west") — the west executable, resolved on PATH.

  • west-yml (default: <WEST_TOPDIR>/west.yml) — the manifest.

  • base (default: ${WEST_TOPDIR}/zephyr-rtos) — ZEPHYR_BASE. The zephyr.base west config entry itself is set separately, after west update and project patches are applied, from west list zephyr -f {path} — i.e. wherever the manifest’s own zephyr project actually landed. Left untouched if the manifest has no project named zephyr.

  • west-config — extra/overriding west config key/value pairs, e.g. {zephyr.base-prefer: env}.

  • blobs-cache — a path to an auto-generated list of west blobs to pre-cache.

  • blobs-fetch-args (default ["--auto-accept"]) — extra west blobs fetch args.

  • skip-blobs-fetch (default false) — skip west blobs fetch entirely.

  • blobs-fetch-allow-failure (default false) — don’t fail the stage if west blobs fetch exits non-zero (e.g. a flaky blob host). Ignored if skip-blobs-fetch: is set.

  • patch-committer-name/patch-committer-email/patch-committer-date — the identity used when applying project patches via west patches (GIT_COMMITTER_NAME/_EMAIL/_DATE), defaulting to denver/denver@denver/2000-01-01T00:00:00 (a fixed value, so applying the same patches twice never produces a different commit).

  • update-args — extra west update args.

  • skip-update (default false) — skip west update entirely (patch application, zephyr.base, and blobs fetch/cache still run).

  • skip-patch-apply (default false) — skip applying projects’ zephyr/patches.yml via west patches.

WEST_CONFIG_SYSTEM (west’s own base-config env var, e.g. the remotes/defaults denver ships) is not a denver.yml key — set it directly via env:/hooks.env like any other real environment variable; west reads it itself, no provider-specific handling needed.

Design notes

  • west packages pip is a separate concern. Installing the Python packages a workspace’s own modules declare (west packages pip) isn’t this provider’s job — give a separate uv stage a requirements: [$(west packages pip)] entry instead (see uv.md), with its own overrides:/freeze-to: for pinning them. It has to run after this stage, since until the workspace is updated there’s no way to know what those packages even are.

  • --ci always adds a fixed shallow-clone strategy (--narrow -o=--depth=1) to west update, on top of whatever update-args: already configures.

  • --fast only checks the workspace is already configured — dies with a clear message if it isn’t, rather than running west update.

  • --force always reruns west update (even if this stage’s own drift check found nothing new) and recreates the workspace setup steps’ own on-disk state unconditionally.

  • --dry-run prints the west commands instead of running them, and writes neither .west/config, the drift fingerprint, nor blobs-cache:. The read-only queries this stage branches on (west config -l, west manifest --resolve, west list, git rev-parse) do still run: they are what decide which west config keys differ, whether west update would be skipped as unchanged, and which projects carry a patches.yml.