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Uploading your contract to a broker

The last step in the defining contracts lifecycle is to upload the contract to the broker. This is important, because otherwise the other side of your contract can't be verified:

ContractCase Case Files​

The Case File is the description of the contract, containing all of the examples you've defined. It can only be written or published if the tests pass. This file is the source for the examples run during contract verification.

What is the broker for​

The broker records:

  • The contract files for each version of each consumer application
  • The verification status for each version of each provider application
  • The environments and other information about which versions are deployed and released

It's necessary to use a broker to get the deployment confidence we promised you in the introduction. However, if you're just getting started or spiking a deploy, you can try sharing the contracts directory (see the end of this section for details).

Setting up a broker​

ContractCase is compatible with the Pact contract broker (see here, which has a docker image you can use to get started). Alternatively, if you prefer a fully supported SaaS solution, you can use the excellent Pactflow.

Everywhere in the broker documentation that refers to Pact flies or Contracts equally applies to ContractCase Case File contracts too.

Publishing a ContractCase Case File​

By default, ContractCase publishes all contracts that are defined in CI. This means you'll need to configure:

  • The broker base URL
  • Either broker basic auth, or a broker access token

See the configuration options for details.

If you need to override this behaviour, you can set publish to either "ALWAYS" or "NEVER".

Contract directory​

In addition to publishing contracts, ContractCase writes a contract file (a Case File) to the contract directory. By default this is ${CURRENT_WORKING_DIRECTORY}/case-contracts, but you can change this with the contractDir configuration option.

Make sure you clear out this directory before each run.

This directory is useful if you are spiking a

Next steps​

Next, you'll want to verify the contract.