README.md

Workflow Global Library

When you have multiple workflow jobs, you often want to share some parts of the workflow scripts between them to keep workflow scripts DRY. A very common use case is that you have many projects that are built in the similar way.

This plugin adds that functionality by creating a "shared library script" Git repository inside Jenkins. Every workflow script in your Jenkins see these shared library scripts in their classpath.

Directory structure

The directory structure of the shared library repository is as follows:

(root)
 +- src                 # groovy source files
     +- org
         +- foo
             +- Bar.groovy  # for org.foo.Bar class

The src directory should look like standard Java source directory structure. This directory is added to the classpath when executing workflows. The groovy source files in this directory get the same sandbox / CPS transformation just like your workflow scripts.

Directories other than "src" is reserved for future enhancements.

Accessing repository

This directory is managed by Git, and you'll deploy new changes through git push. The repository is exposed in two endpoints:

• http://server/jenkins/workflowLibs.git (when your Jenkins is http://server/jenkins/.
• ssh://USERNAME@server:PORT/workflowLibs.git through Jenkins SSH

Having the shared library script in Git allows you to track changes, perform tested deployments, and reuse the same scripts across a large number of instances.

Writing shared code

At the base level, any valid Groovy code is OK. So you can define data structures, utility functions, and etc., like this:

$ cat src/org/foo/Bar.groovy
package org.foo;

// point in 3D space
class Point {
  float x,y,z;
}

More often than not, what you want to define is a series of functions that in turn invoke other workflow step functions. You can do this by not explicitly defining the enclosing class, just like your main workflow script itself:

$ cat src/org/foo/Zot.groovy
package org.foo;

def checkOutFrom(repo) {
  git url: "git@github.com:jenkinsci/${repo}"
}

You can then call such function from your main workflow script like this:

def z = new org.foo.Zot()
z.checkOutFrom(repo)