Gitlab CI: How to use the bash shell on a Windows runner - windows

Question

From the GitLab CI documentation the bash shell is supported on Windows.
Supported systems by different shells:
Shells Bash Windows Batch PowerShell
Windows ✓ ✓ (default) ✓
In my config.toml, I have tried:
[[runners]]
name = "myTestRunner"
url = xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
token = xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
executor = "shell"
shell = "bash"
But if my .gitlab-ci.yml attempts to execute bash script, for example
stages:
- Stage1
testJob:
stage: Stage1
when: always
script:
- echo $PWD
tags:
- myTestRunner
And then from the folder containing the GitLab multi runner I right-click and select 'git bash here' and then type:
gitlab-runner.exe exec shell testJob
It cannot resolve $PWD, proving it is not actually using a bash executor. (Git bash can usually correctly print out $PWD on Windows.)
Running with gitlab-runner 10.6.0 (a3543a27)
Using Shell executor...
Running on G0329...
Cloning repository...
Cloning into 'C:/GIT/CI_dev_project/builds/0/project-0'...
done.
Checking out 8cc3343d as bashFromBat...
Skipping Git submodules setup
$ echo $PWD
$PWD
Job succeeded
The same thing happens if I push a commit, and the web based GitLab CI terminal automatically runs the .gitlab-ci script.
How do I correctly use the Bash terminal in GitLab CI on Windows?

Answer 1

Firstly my guess is that it is not working as it should (see the comment below your question). I found a workaround, maybe it is not what you need but it works. For some reason the command "echo $PWD" is concatenated after bash command and then it is executed in a Windows cmd. That is why the result is "$PWD". To replicate it execute the following in a CMD console (only bash is open):
bash && echo $PWD
The solution is to execute the command inside bash with option -c (it is not the ideal solution but it works). The .gitlab-ci.yml should be:
stages:
- Stage1
testJob:
stage: Stage1
when: always
script:
- bash -c "echo $PWD"
tags:
- myTestRunner