What are the options for release management using Jenkins

Question

I'm evaluating build engines like Jenkins and Apache Continuum. The bulk of our build is using Maven. What options are there in Jenkins for release management?

By release management I mean the process of creating a release from a branch in source control, then updating the version tag in Maven. For example, if my Maven project (parent + child sub-projects) is currently at version 5.5-SNAPSHOT, I would like to tell Jenkins to check out, build, and test the latest of this branch, and update the POMs to version 5.5. Then, it should create a new branch in source control for version 5.6-SNAPSHOT, and update all the POMs on this new branch accordingly.

Apache Continuum, which I believe was developed by Sonatype, the same team behind Maven, has this release management feature. I've seen a plugin for Jenkins called the Artifactory Plugin, which seems to require that the repository manager is Artifactory. What other release management options are available for Jenkins? What is the best practice?

Thanks,

Steve Solomon stev.solomon@gmail.com

Answer 1

Jenkins supports releasing: https://wiki.jenkins-ci.org/display/JENKINS/Release+Plugin

It's supported by both Maven and free-style projects. Artifactory is not required.

Answer 2

I'd recommend taking a look at the M2 Release Plugin for Jenkins. It's a Jenkins front end for the mvn-release-plugin.