Getting started with Jenkins and Node

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What is Jenkins?

Jenkins is an application that monitors executions of repeated jobs, such as building a software project. Jenkins focuses on two main areas:

• building/testing software projects continuously
• monitoring executions of externally-run jobs.

Jenkins is great for setting up continuous integration/deployment. It is written in Java, but is a general purpose tool, so setting up with Node is a piece of cake.

Preparing the server

In order to test our Node projects with Jenkins, we will need Jenkins, Node and Git installed. There is a detailed manual on how to setup it on various systems here.

Also, if you are using ansible, the following simple playbook should do the trick:

—-
# This playbook deploys Jenkins
- name: Setting up roles
  hosts: jenkins
  user: root
  vars:
    nodejs_version : “0.11.13"
  roles:
   — Ansibles.git
   — avanov.jenkins
   — JasonGiedymin.nodejs
  tags:
   — setup

If everything went ok, you should be seeing Jenkins’ welcome screen at your server’s 8080 port.

Setting up Jenkins

First, set up a user at Manage Jenkins > Manage Users.

By default, Jenkins does not use any authentication — fix that asap! Go to Manage Jenkins then click Setup Security.

Here check the following items:

• Jenkins’ own user database (but not Allow users to sign up)
• Matrix-based security

Make sure, the Git plugin is installed too (Manage Jenkins > Manage Plugins).

Now you should be good to go!

Setting up your first Node project

To do so, click on New Item, then choose Build a free-style software project.

At the next dialog, go for Source Code Management and choose Git (or any other). Here, set up the necessary credentials, then choose Add build step > Execute Shell.

That’s it! After clicking Save then Build now, your first build should start! ☺

Next Up

In the next post we will discover how pipelines can be built in Jenkins for continuous integration/delivery.

About us

RisingStack is a Node.js consulting company specialised in API development and empowering businesses to be successful with Node.js by trainings, consulting and development.