The openshift/must-gather repository is a client tool written primarily in Shell that collects diagnostic information from OpenShift clusters. The tool gathers cluster operator data and associated namespace information, depositing the collected data into a user-specified base directory location. This functionality is accessible to users through the oc adm must-gather command, which provides command-line options for customizing the collection process.
The repository's core functionality centers on data collection scripts stored in the collection-scripts directory. These scripts are designed to be placed in the /usr/bin directory within the container image and focus exclusively on collecting data from components included in the OpenShift CVO payload. The project explicitly discourages inclusion of collection logic for external components, instead encouraging those projects to create their own dedicated must-gather images following a similar pattern.
The development workflow for must-gather involves building container images using the provided Makefile, which supports two build options: imagebuilder as the default builder or podman as an alternative. When using podman, developers must configure an AUTH_FILE parameter with credentials for the registry.ci.openshift.org registry and maintain an active VPN connection. After building the image locally, developers push it to an accessible registry for testing against actual clusters.
GitGenius activity tracking reveals that the repository experiences relatively slow issue and pull request response times, with a median latency of 665.6 hours and a mean of 5537.4 hours across tracked items. The most frequently applied issue labels include tide/merge-blocker appearing twice, along with lifecycle/rotten and lifecycle/stale labels, suggesting some challenges with issue management velocity. The most active contributors tracked by GitGenius are sferich888 with four events, bplaxco with three events, and oarribas with two events.
The repository maintains connections with other OpenShift projects through overlapping contributors, specifically linking to victoriametrics/operator, openshift/installer, and openshift/console. This contributor overlap indicates shared maintenance patterns across the OpenShift ecosystem.
A notable aspect of the must-gather project is its attention to security and privacy. The repository acknowledges the importance of obfuscating and omitting confidential information from gathered data, directing users to the separate openshift/must-gather-clean repository for dedicated tooling and information on this sanitization effort. This separation of concerns allows the core collection tool to focus on comprehensive data gathering while delegating sensitive data handling to a specialized companion project.
The tool's classification across multiple diagnostic and operational categories reflects its broad utility in OpenShift cluster troubleshooting and analysis, spanning container diagnostics, health checks, log collection, resource usage monitoring, and comprehensive system analysis capabilities.
