Customize the Help page message

  • Tier: Free, Premium, Ultimate
  • Offering: GitLab Self-Managed

In large organizations, it is useful to have information about who to contact or where to go for help. You can customize and display this information on the GitLab /help page.

Add a help message to the Help page

You can add a help message, which is shown at the top of the GitLab /help page (for example, https://gitlab.com/help):

  1. On the left sidebar, at the bottom, select Admin. If you’ve turned on the new navigation, in the upper-right corner, select your avatar and then select Admin.
  2. Select Settings > Preferences.
  3. Expand Help page.
  4. In Additional text to show on the Help page, enter the information you want to display on /help.
  5. Select Save changes.

You can now see the message on /help.

By default, /help is visible to unauthenticated users. However, if the Public visibility level is restricted, /help is visible only to authenticated users.

Add a help message to the sign-in page

To add a help message to the sign-in page, customize your sign-in and register pages.

Hide marketing-related entries from the Help page

GitLab marketing-related entries are occasionally shown on the Help page. To hide these entries:

  1. On the left sidebar, at the bottom, select Admin. If you’ve turned on the new navigation, in the upper-right corner, select your avatar and then select Admin.
  2. Select Settings > Preferences.
  3. Expand Help page.
  4. Select the Hide marketing-related entries from the Help page checkbox.
  5. Select Save changes.

Set a custom Support page URL

You can specify a custom URL to which users are directed when they:

  • Select Help > Support.
  • Select See our website for help on the Help page.
  1. On the left sidebar, at the bottom, select Admin. If you’ve turned on the new navigation, in the upper-right corner, select your avatar and then select Admin.
  2. Select Settings > Preferences.
  3. Expand Help page.
  4. In the Support page URL field, enter the URL.
  5. Select Save changes.

Redirect /help pages

You can redirect all /help links to a destination that meets the necessary requirements.

  1. On the left sidebar, at the bottom, select Admin. If you’ve turned on the new navigation, in the upper-right corner, select your avatar and then select Admin.
  2. Select Settings > Preferences.
  3. Expand Help page.
  4. In the Documentation pages URL field, enter the URL.
  5. Select Save changes.

If the Documentation pages URL field is empty, the GitLab instance displays a basic version of the documentation sourced from the doc directory of GitLab.

Destination requirements

When redirecting /help, GitLab:

  • Uses the specified URL as the base URL for the redirect.
  • Constructs the full URL by:
    • Adding the version number (${VERSION}).
    • Adding the documentation path.
    • Removing any .md file extensions.

For example, if the URL is set to https://docs.gitlab.com, requests for /help/administration/settings/help_page.md redirect to: https://docs.gitlab.com/${VERSION}/administration/settings/help_page.