Jenkins is an open-source tool developed to automate continuous integration (CI) and continuous delivery (CD) processes. It is available for free.

What is Jenkins?

Jenkins is an automation server. Developed with Java, Jenkins assists developers with continuous integration (CI) and continuous delivery (CD). It automates the stages of the software development process, including build, test, and deployment.

Software is continuously worked on even after the initial development phase. Development teams use specific tools and methods to add new features or perform regular maintenance. In projects where different developers are working, changes need to be tested and integrated into the project. Jenkins handles the stages of building, testing, and deployment of these changes. If an error is detected, it notifies the developers.

Continuous integration (CI) involves testing the developed code and integrating it with the main project. Developers use various version control systems, such as Git-based GitHub and GitLab. Jenkins tests the code it receives and, if it passes the tests successfully, sends it to the Git repository.

Continuous delivery (CD) involves deploying the developed software to the production environment, making it available to the end-users. Jenkins can automate this deployment process without any need for manual intervention.

What is Jenkins Pipeline?

The pipeline can be thought of as a process pipeline. In its operations, Jenkins follows a specific sequence of processes defined by the developers beforehand. Jenkins then automates the CI/CD processes by following this pipeline.

Advantages of Using Jenkins

Jenkins is widely used in the software development field and offers many advantages to developers. The key benefits of using Jenkins include:

• Jenkins is completely free and open-source.
• It is developed with the needs of developers in mind, automating CI/CD processes and speeding up the development cycle.
• It is easy to install and use, and it works on Windows, Linux, and macOS operating systems.
• Developed with Java, it can run on various platforms.
• It has a large user base, making it a widely accepted tool in the software development industry.
• Jenkins continues to be developed with community support and can gain additional features through various plugins. There are numerous plugins available for Jenkins.

Development of Jenkins

The development of Jenkins, which assists developers in CD/CI processes, dates back to 2004. Initially named Hudson, the project was developed by Kohsuke Kawaguchi and his team at Sun Microsystems. Released as open-source, the project quickly gained a large user base.

In 2010, Oracle acquired Sun Microsystems, leading to some disagreements between the Hudson community and Oracle. As a result, in 2011, the Hudson community decided to rename the tool to Jenkins. On the other hand, Oracle decided to continue with Hudson and donated it to the Eclipse Foundation. The development of Hudson ended in 2017, while Jenkins continues to be actively developed.