Simple tools to fight bigger quality battle

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Simple tools to fight the bigger Quality Battle

Continuous Integration using batch files and task scheduler

  By:                                                                                                               

Komal Joshi                                      Director:Atlantis Software Ltd.       

Patrick Martin                                   Sr Software Engineer (Consultant)

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Agenda

• Introduction to CI • How it works

 • CI suitable for our needs

 • Challenges Faced

 • Our Solution

 • Implementation

 • Q/A

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Say Hello to CI..

• Software development practice where members of a team integrate their work frequently, usually each person integrates at least daily - leading to multiple integrations per day.

 • Integration verified by an automated build (including test) integration

errors are detected as quickly as possible.  • Significantly reduced integration problems

 • Teams develop cohesive software more rapidly and to higher quality

standards.

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Why CI ?

• Last minute changes • Resource Crisis

 • Quality was very important for financial

application • Tight schedule

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Challenges

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Challenges FacedApplication• Delphi based • Standalone desktop

Resources• Few• Not highly technical

So we needed a solution that was:• Easy to implement• Not tied to a specific technology• Could be easily replicated• Should be a simple one click solution.• Easily configurable.

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Solution was

• No heavy weight Client/Server application but task schedulers• No XML but easily configurable text files 

• No fuss-setup but one click execution of batch files• 'Out of the box' continous build batch process

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Key Features

•  Distributed in nature • No web tools commonly associated with modern distributed

architecture.• The entire system was achieved by simple text files.• No fuss batch files• Open source and simple tools 

  •  Technology Agnostic

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High Level Implementation

developer tester

repository

build appliance

test appliance

App1

more...

more...

App2step 0

step 1

step 2 step 2

App4

App3

step 3

step 4

step 5 - test!

test appliance

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Process Steps

step 0: run the product build script• creates / updates checkout

 step 1: develop / test product• can be developer, tester or ad-hoc testing

 step 2: commit changes• can be developer, tester or ad-hoc testing

 step 3: post-commit actions• repository post-commit actions queues up revisions to be built (perhaps)

 step 4: build revision (perhaps)• build appliances run product build script: build if required due to update

 step 5: test (perhaps)• test appliances run product update script and test

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Subversion Repository

Build Machines

Test Machines

VbSend Mail Utility

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Overall Flow

repository

post-commit + task drop markers to build machine(s)

tasks on build machines pick up revisions; build

successful build tasks drop test markers; notify

tasks on test machines pick up revision build for test

run tests; archive tested revisions

summarise results and notify team

commit to repository

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Subversion Repository

• Post Commit Hookso Copy the build-markers

• Scheduled tasks after 10 minuteso Poll to check for markerso Kick off scripts to Parse the machines names from .txt fileso Copy the markers to remote machineso Run the scheduled tasks remotely

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Repo: Config File with machine name and build

Repo: Config File with machine name and task

names

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Build Machine

• Build-Scriptso Kicked off by the parameters in Schedule tasks

• Scheduled tasks after 10 minuteso Poll to check for markers/Kicked off remotelyo Kick off scripts passed as parameterso Copy the markers from build-rev to ‘done-revs’o Kick off scripts to Parse the Test machines names +Tests from .txt fileso Copy the markers to test machines

• Config fileso Normal text files containing-

Test machine name Name of tests Type of release (Debug or normal)

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Build-Machine: Config File with machine name and Test

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Test Machine

• Automated-Test-Scriptso Kicked off by the parameters in Schedule tasks

• Scheduled tasks after 10 minuteso Poll to check for markerso Kick off scripts passed as parameters

• Send Mail utility + Logo Mail the results to people in the list from the log

• Any automation toolo Should be invoked from command line

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sendmail.bat

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All sounds quite complex... How about a demo?

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A CI Template

The processCommit to repository • post-commit hook appends new revision notification to revs queue

(asynchronous) post new revision notification • post any revs found into revs queue of build appliance 

(asynchronous) build appliance pick-up of revs queue • walk the revs queue: update and if file changes noted, build - move to done-

revs notify teamif successful build then post build notification to test appliance

(asynchronous) test appliance pick-up of revs queue • walk the revs queue: update and test - move to done-revs; notify team

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A Boot Strap Script

The complete bootstrap script simply takes a root folder argument and creates:• the repository + extra folders/files if required in the repo sub-folder• an example project in the repository• the revision queue check task• the folder for the "build appliance" checkout• the folder for the "test appliance" checkout• the post-commit hook• the script to post new revisions• the scheduled task to invoke the post new revisions script• the update/build/test scripts for the appliances in the scripts folder• the scheduled task to update and build the "build appliance" 

       checkout• the scheduled task to update and test the "test appliance" 

       checkout

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A Boot Strap Script

 Final output of the script:ROOT- scripts- repo- build-appliance- test-appliance

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boot-strap.bat

It's that simple #1

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post-revs.bat

It's that simple #2

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build-revs.bat

It's that simple #3

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test-revs.bat

It's that simple #4

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SHOW Me the DEMO please #$*#

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setup of CI system using bootstrapper

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CI tasks created by bootstrap

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example developer change

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output from CI system due to change

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QUESTIONS???

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Thanks

Contact :Komal Joshi:        [email protected]  [email protected] Martin:   [email protected]

Thanks To our team:Colin Towers, Ben Murray and Fergus Bown