Project Templates

Vaibify ships with three project templates that provide starting configurations for common use cases. Select a template when initializing a new project:

vaibify init --template <name>

Each template contains container.conf and project.json (plus any starter files, such as the workflow template’s step directories). vaibify init copies those into the current directory, moves project.json into .vaibify/projects/, and then generates vaibify.yml from the built-in defaults — the template does not supply it.

sandbox

An empty starting point for exploration, prototyping, and interactive use. No pipeline steps are defined — you work directly inside the container.

Includes:

Empty container.conf (no repositories).
Empty project.json (no pipeline steps).

Use this template when you want a containerized environment without a predefined project.

toolkit

A workspace for editing several peer code repositories side-by-side — the right choice when you want to hack on more than one package at once while iterating on a change that spans them.

Includes:

Empty container.conf (add your repository URLs).
Empty project.json (no pipeline steps).
A README explaining how repository tracking and push controls work.

Toolkit containers have no workflow. Instead, the Repos panel in the dashboard provides per-repository git status, dirty-file listings, and push controls for every repository in /workspace/.

workflow

A starting point for reproducible data analysis pipelines. Includes a runnable two-step example — data generation feeding a plot — that you replace with your own steps.

Includes:

Empty container.conf (add your repositories).
Example project.json with two steps: GenerateSamples, which runs python generateSamples.py to produce samples.json, and PlotHistogram, which runs python plotHistogram.py with the samples file passed via a {step:generate-samples.samples} token.
The two step directories with the scripts those commands invoke.

Use this template when your project follows a defined sequence of analysis steps that should be reproducible.

Adding LaTeX compilation: If you compile your manuscript inside the container rather than using an external tool like Overleaf, add a step to project.json. Note that a step’s directory basename must equal the slug derived from its name — CompileManuscript here — so the manuscript sources live in a directory named after the step:

{
    "sName": "CompileManuscript",
    "sStepId": "compile-manuscript",
    "sDirectory": "CompileManuscript",
    "bRunEnabled": true,
    "bPlotOnly": false,
    "saDataCommands": [],
    "saOutputDataFiles": [],
    "saPlotCommands": ["latexmk -pdf manuscript.tex"],
    "saPlotFiles": []
}

Creating Custom Templates

Templates are stored in the vaibify/templates/ directory of the Vaibify package, so they ship inside the installed distribution. Each template is a subdirectory containing container.conf and project.json, plus any starter step directories. To create a custom template, add a new subdirectory with these files and reinstall the package. Do not place a vaibify.yml in a template: vaibify init always generates that file itself, so one shipped in a template would be overwritten.