I want to be able to automate Jenkins server installation using a script.
I want, given Jenkins release version and a list of {(plugin,version)}, to run a script that will deploy me a new jenkins server and start it using Jetty or Tomcat.
It sounds like a common thing to do (in need to replicate Jenkins master enviroment or create a clean one). Do you know what's the best practice in this case?
Searching Google only gives me examples of how to deploy products with Jenkins but I want to actually deploy Jenkins.
Thanks!
this may require some additional setup at the beginning but perhaps could save you time in the long run. You could use a product called puppet (puppetlabs.com) to automatically trigger the script when you want. I'm basically using that to trigger build outs of my development environments. As I find new things that need to be modified, I simply update my puppet modules and don't need to worry about what needs to be done to recreate the environments through testing for the next go round.
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I want to design a wordpress development process like in following picture:
First I want to create a bitbucket repository for my Wordpress site. From this repository all our software developers should able to clone the site to their local machines for developing. For developing all developers should have one local database to test changes.
After a developer finished a task he should be able to push his changes to the repo. When a sprint is done I want to send all changes from the repo with Jenkins pipeline/job to the test environment. At this environment a tester should be able to test all new functions with a cloned database from the prod system (including the dev changes).
When all tests are successfully done I want be able to apply the database changes to the prod system (with a SQL script) and send all changes with an other Jekins pipeline/job to the prod system.
Do you think this can work? Whats with plugin updates? Can I setup environment variables for each system so the plugin updates can be just done on the dev machine?
I'm not sure if this could work because a plugin or plugin update creates a lot of new database changes and I think I need a tool who can display all changes like Sourcetree for git.
Is there someone who has expert knowledge with wordpress and this kind of development process and can share his experience with me?
Or do you think this process is not working with wordpress? If this is true it would be realy bad because I need a process like this.
Thanks a lot!
I don't really know Wordpress, but the process you describe is definitely possible (I've implemented similar solutions on Drupal and Adobe Experience Manager, for instance).
However...
It's hard.
In a CMS project, a change/new feature can include:
a code change (PHP, CSS, JavaScript)
a database structure change (e.g. a new table)
a database content change (e.g. a copy fix, or default/test content)
a configuration change
Working out which version should get what is really hard. You want a developer to commit a change, and have that change replicated on QA with test content - but once QA sign it off, you probably don't want to promote that test content to production. And config changes should probably flow between systems but with different values for each environment.
For managing the database changes, I've found a plug-in that monitors database changes; no idea how scriptable that is.
See WP Activity Log.
What I've done in the past in similar situations is write a script that creates the database definition for each change - so a developer can run that script, and commit it as part of their code change. It requires a lot of discipline, though - you can only modify the database structure by using the scripts.
The correct answer is yes you can do this. I know WordPress, Bit-bucket, GIT, SVN, Linux, Ubuntu exceptionally well. I have built a system very similar to what you describe and use it daily.
The problem stated is the CMS can get tricky. That is true, but you need to use the correct tools for the correct upgrades. So, WordPress ALREADY has versioning and revisions built into it. The DATABASE doesn't need to be involved at all
First off. The database doesn't need to be updated unless you are updating plugins. But for strict development no DB pushes are necessary. So have your developers check files in and out of Bit-bucket. When the lead developer approves the changes have him migrate / push to the MASTER BRANCH in your REPO. Inside of bit-bucket there is a tool called GIT HOOKS. You can trigger a php file on the server every time there is a push to the production branch. What the PHP file does is simply trigger the linux command GIT PULL which will update all the code on the server with what in on your PRODUCTION BRANCH. GIT PULL will also remove any files if files were removed etc. On the server you will have a "checked out" copy of the GIT repo and on linux the credentials after the first clone will be stored. Simply have your PHP file trigger a BASH script that does a GIT PULL. Done.
No matter how many developers you have there will always need to be a set of eyes that reviews the code changes and merges those into production. I.e. that is where the Lead Developer comes into play.
FYI. The only directories in your wordpress instance that needs to be in bitbucket is the THEME DIRECTORY and the PLUGINS directory. You DO NOT need to sync the entire WP install which is pretty large.
In the case that you would be building custom Plugins, again, it is just code that is stored in the plugins directory. If your custom plugins are built correctly and require the use of Databases then when they are activated they will immediately build the WP DB's that are needed. Likewise, correctly built plugin will also drop its own custom table when uninstalled.
You will need to sync the 2 below directories.
Plugins folder resides in: wp-content/plugins/
Themes Folder is wp-content/themes/SELECTED_THEME
Any additional questions just ask and I am here.
From my experience it is always better to allow each developer to have their own Branch and to setup the the Dev server a dedicated master branch for quality control. you can check out some documentation on how to set this up https://plixxer.com/docs/server-management/website-quality-control/
basically you want to have a live server and dev server. The live server should only ever pull from the REPO and and the Dev and coders can pull or Push from the repo. My team treats the dev server as a quality checking station. If the current live code is not up to our standards the entire dev is rolled back to what is live on the master branch. When code in the master succeeds our standards we pull from the master branch onto the live server. Each developer should have their own branch for testing on their local server. Let me know if you need some help on setting up a local environment with GIT.
You will want to make a distinction around "build" and another around "release". The workflow I understand is that developers call their local workstations "dev", and pull request their work to the develop branch (you may have already read through Gitflow). Then, using your choice of CI automation, you get the latest source into a build area and do that - build it. Check out Ansible. If you have BitBucket, maybe you also want to organize your sprint with the likes of Jira? Then you have pretty seemless integration of your sprint objectives with actual branches containing the relative work/source. Ansible can help you automate builds and releases to the point where you are doing daily builds, and running the unit tests across your builds in the various integration environments.
During builds, you would have different configuration files being factored in depending on the target environment. This is how to care for environment configuration. It is part of the build process, and ideally all configuration is possible through the build. For example, a connection string might be different across the environment if you are having different databases to isolate migration of schema changes. For example, in a Angular application you would execute ng b --prod to build production and this would bring in a production configuration file during build to change the connection string (for example).
More about configuration specific to environments... you can also include post deployment scripts that get deployed and executed after files are uploaded so that they will configure the environment as required.
Ask your questions below, and I will do my best to build this out into a comprehensive guide.
Should end to end tests be run at build time (running the application on the build server), or after deployment? I have not yet found a solid answer for which one is the standard.
Edit
I mean after deploying either to QA/SIT/UAT etc... vs. just running it on a build server without fully deploying it.
The whole point of having a build server is to create a single build of the current source code, of which you run tests and make sure that things work before you deploy them. I don't know why anyone would want to run tests after then have been deployed. What happens if you find a bug? You going to roll back the deployment? Always test before deployment.
Ideally, you would have a build environment that mimics your production environment that will allow you to run tests in a "deployed" environment. It's the reason that you have a development/staging/production servers.
Deployments from IDEA are possible, e.g. I can connect to remote server and I can upload a package. The deployment process I have involves a little bit more than just deploying a file on server.
Once the file is uploaded I need to run certain commands to complete the deployment which mean I need to connect to the server and run those commands one by one and I am looking to do that through one click from the IntelliJ IDEA.
Is that possible?
This is how the project directory looks like:
This is how I am trying to setup deployment:
if you click on that little "Fix" button that's what I see
Even if I try to remove the unwanted entries they come back and never go away.
Finally this is what my project structure looks like in idea
Yes, you can use Remote SSH External tools. Make a script that will run your commands, deploy it to the server as well, then run this script remotely via a tool.
In the Run/Debug configuration Before Launch steps you can add your remote external tool to run automatically.
You can find some more details in my another answer.
As part of my job I evaluate many software and applications.
I need to have an environment that is easy to clean (so the previous apps are not bloating my system) and always light.
One idea is to create isolated environments (either by Docker or Virtual machines) and fire up a new environment every time I need to start over with new software to evaluate.
Questions:
1.Does Docker support this? Can I use it to create new environment every few days and test software in it?
2. If not, which VM system would be suitable for this particular need?
Thanks
This is exactly what all the Continuous Integration systems do: get fresh code, build your project and run tests inside the freshly created container. This is how clean testing is done nowadays. So Docker fits perfectly your needs.
Each fresh container is a clean environment where you can run your tests in. Then you can parse the result and remove the container, for example docker run --rm -it my-image ./tests.sh
While I only have a github repository that I'm pushing to (alone), I often forget to run tests, or forget to commit all relevant files, or rely on objects residing on my local machine. These result in build breaks, but they are only detected by Travis-CI after the erroneous commit. I know TeamCity has a pre-commit testing facility (which relies on the IDE in use), but my question is with regards to the current use of continuous integration as opposed to any one implementation. My question is
Why aren't changes tested on a clean build machine - such as those which Travis-CI uses for post-commit tesing - before those changes are committed?
Such a process would mean that there would never be build breaks, meaning that a fresh environment could pull any commit from the repository and be sure of its success; as such, I don't understand why CI isn't implemented using post-commit testing.
I preface my answer with the details that I am running on GitHub and Jenkins.
Why should a developer have to run all tests locally before committing. Especially in the Git paradigm that is not a requirement. What if, for instance, it takes 15-30 minutes to run all of the tests. Do you really want your developers or you personally sitting around waiting for the tests to run locally before your commit and push your changes?
Our process usually goes like this:
Make changes in local branch.
Run any new tests that you have created.
Commit changes to local branch.
Push local changes remotely to GitHub and create pull request.
Have build process pick up changes and run unit tests.
If tests fail, then fix them in local branch and push them locally.
Get changes code reviewed in pull request.
After approval and all checks have passed, push to master.
Rerun all unit tests.
Push artifact to repository.
Push changes to an environment (ie DEV, QA) and run any integration/functional tests that rely on a full environment.
If you have a cloud then you can push your changes to a new node and only after all environment tests pass reroute the VIP to the new node(s)
Repeat 11 until you have pushed through all pre-prod environments.
If you are practicing continuous deployment then push your changes all the way to PROD if all testing, checks, etc pass.
My point is that it is not a good use of a developers time to run tests locally impeding their progress when you can off-load that work onto a Continuous Integration server and be notified of issues that you need to fix later. Also, some tests simply can't be run until you commit them and deploy the artifact to an environment. If an environment is broken because you don't have a cloud and maybe you only have one server, then fix it locally and push the changes quickly to stabilize the environment.
You can run tests locally if you have to, but this should not be the norm.
As to the multiple developer issue, open source projects have been dealing with that for a long time now. They use forks in GitHub to allow contributors the chance to suggest new fixes and functionality, but this is not really that different from a developer on the team creating a local branch, pushing it remotely, and getting team buy-in via code review before pushing. If someone pushes changes that break your changes then you try to fix them yourself first and then ask for their help. You should be following the principle of "merging early and often" as well as merging in updates from master to your branch periodically.
The assumption that if you write code and it compiles and tests are passed locally, no builds could be broken is wrong. It is only so, if you are the only developer working on that code.
But let's say I change the interface you are using, my code will compile and pass tests
as long as I don't get your updated code That uses my interface.
Your code will compile and pass tests as long as you don't get my update in the interface.
And when we both check in our code, the build machine explodes...
So CI is a process which basically say: put your changes in as soon as possible
and test them in the CI server (it should be of course compiled and tested locally first).
If all developers follow those rules,
the build will still break, but we will know about it sooner rather than later.
The CI server is not the same as the version control system. The CI server, too, checks the code out of the repository. And therefore the code has already been committed when it gets tested on the CI server.
More extensive tests may be run periodically, rather than at time of checking in, on whatever is the current version of the code at the time of testing. Think of multi-platform tests or load tests.
Generally, of course, you'll unit test your code on your development machine before checking it in.