Parameterized Build - Multiple "instances" of a single parametrized job (a template) AKA fixed parametrized build

[Alberto Scotto]

Hi

Long story short, I was wondering if anyone ever felt the need for (and knows of any implementation of) the possibility of "instantiating" (OO terminology) a parametrized build.

What I mean is treating a parametrized build as a template, from which many "instances" can be generated.

Each instance is supposed to define a different combination of values for the parameters.

The final goal is twofold:

1. DRY (which is given simply by the parametrized build concept)

2.1 having separate build histories / test reports for each instance (otherwise it would be a mess)

2.2 the instances would be schedulable directly in jenkins UI (while a parametrized build is not)

The template would then be used only for:

- manual builds

- changing the config for all of the instances at once

Now, time for some context, as I may be missing something in my overall approach.

You are welcome to point me in the right direction :)

I have a maven project with a suite of selenium tests that I want jenkins to run.

The suite is parametrized: browser, OS, test environment.

So, I can run it e.g. with `mvn test -Dbrowser=chrome -Dplatform=win [..]`.

I want a separate test report for each combination of my parameters.

As a newbie, my first solution was "Copy existing job".

Quick and dirty. But effective.

As you will know, problems arise when you need to make a change to the configuration of the job, and you want to keep in sync all of these copy&pasted jobs.

Then I found the parametrized build feature.

It's very cool (code reuse/maintainability++), but the test report and the build history is shared among all of the actual builds, therefore I can not rely on them for a tidy reporting like "this test is always failing on IE; but it isn't on chrome", and so on.

Thank you very much in advance

AS

[Dirk Kuypers]

Hi,

I use the job-dsl plugin to generate thousands of test projects via a groovy script. I have a template job and some string arrays with my parameters for test categories which are iterated for job generation.

Some of the main code snippets:

def create_windowsBatch = { name, filter ->

  return """cd %CCRoot%

  MKDIR ..\\TestResults

  UnitTest.bat ConformanceTests /resultsfile:..\\TestResults\\${name}.trx /category:\"$filter\" """

}

def create_project = { my_name, filter, my_priority, day ->

  def str_myName = my_name

  println("Creating/Reconfiguring project with parameters: $my_name, $filter, $my_priority, $day")

  def str_batchfile = create_windowsBatch(my_name, filter)

  def str_jobDescription = create_jobDescription(filter)

  job {

      disabled(false)

      name(str_myName)

      description(str_jobDescription)

      using 'Nightly_Tests_Template'

      logRotator(-1, 10, -1, 5)

      priority (my_priority)

      environmentVariables( CCRoot:"\${WORKSPACE}\\${str_upstream_job}" )

  parameters {

stringParam("UPSTREAM_JOB", "${str_upstream_job}", "The upstream job name to use for this build")

  }

      triggers {

          cron("30 20 * * ${day}")

      }

      scm {

          cloneWorkspace(str_upstream_job, "Not Failed")

      }

      steps {

        batchFile(str_batchfile)

      }

  }

  counter++

}

[...]

for (item_systemType in str_allSystemTypes)

{

  for (item_applicationType in str_applicationTypesToSplit)

  {

    create_project("${jobname_factory("$item_applicationType-$item_systemType", "WCDMA")}", "$item_applicationType&$item_systemType&Virtual", 120, "$str_day")

  }

}

HTH

Dirk

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[Alberto Scotto]

Turns out there is a builtin solution that does what I want.

https://wiki.jenkins-ci.org/display/JENKINS/Building+a+matrix+project

And it is mentioned in "Jenknis the definitive guide" specifically as the way to go when building jobs running web tests against multiple browsers/OSs.

Still, one lack I can see: you can't build a single combination, as the build btn is present only at the "top level".

Also, I don't like the fact that it is implemented as a different type of project (you need to specifically create a "multi-configuration project"), and I'm afraid that you lose something compared to "build a mvn project", but I don't know for sure.

Anyway, I think it would be a much cleaner solution if it were an option *pluggable* in every type of project.

We may work that out. Anyone?

Alberto Scotto alb-i986.me

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[Benjamin Lau]

I've done templated builds using the technique described in this article and it worked quite well:
http://www.blackpepper.co.uk/generating-new-jenkins-jobs-from-templates-and-parameterised-builds/

For the matrix builds... take a look at the combination filter. This plug-in might also be useful though I've never used it myself:
https://wiki.jenkins-ci.org/display/JENKINS/Matrix+Combinations+Plugin

To make my life easier I had another job triggering my matrix job (using parameterized trigger) so I could have a bunch of preset combinations that I could use. I think I had single runs, a slightly larger set for debugging, and a huge set for production releases. It was at a previous job so I don't have the examples handy. I just passed the combination filter value in as a parameter value.

Cheers,
Ben