Hudson 3 Essentials: Here is a book that makes life easier for Java developers or administrators by teaching you how to automate application testing using Hudson 3. Fast-paced and hands-on, the guide covers everything from installation to writing plugins.

An environment variable is a variable that stores a value that is used by an operating system or a process (application).

In this book, I will use Unix-style environment variables in examples. If you are using Windows, simply replace ${MY_VARIABLE} with %MY_VARIABLE%.

The method of setting environment variables is operating system dependent, but the format of creating and modifying environment variables is similar.

As an example, we will show how to add the JAVA_HOME environment variable on both Linux and Windows operating systems. This example assumes that the JDK has been installed to ${HOME}/jdk1.7.0_25 on Linux and to C:\jdk1.7.0_25 on Windows.

To set the JAVA_HOME environment variable in a Linux system that uses the bash shell, add the following lines to the ${HOME}/.bashrc file:

export JAVA_HOME=${HOME}/jdk1.7.0_25
export...

Hudson requires a JDK (Java Development Kit). There is an official and closed source JDK that is provided by Oracle and even an open source JDK.

The Oracle JDK can be downloaded from http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/index.html.

Instructions on how to install OpenJDK, the open source version of the JDK, can be found at http://openjdk.java.net/install/index.html.

The Oracle JDK will be used for the examples in this book, since OpenJDK installs easily only on Linux. Hudson documentation recommends using the Oracle JDK 1.6.0. However, since this version of JDK has reached its end of life (the end of public updates was on February 2013), and Hudson seems to work on JDK 1.7.0, this book will use the latest version of the 1.7.0 release, currently 1.7.0_25.

After installing the JDK, create the environment variable ${JAVA_HOME} as described previously, and set its value to the installation directory of the JDK. Then add ${JAVA_HOME}/bin to the beginning of...

This book will use the latest version of Hudson (3.0.1) that is available at the time this book is written. This book will cover some of the upcoming new features of Version 3.1 in Chapter 7, Upgrading Hudson and the Team Concept feature. This version of Hudson can be downloaded from http://eclipse.org/downloads/download.php?file=/hudson/war/hudson-3.0.1.war.

The Hudson .war file includes an embedded version of the jetty servlet container. This allows the Hudson .war file to run as a standalone application.

From a console on your operating system, change the directory to the location of the Hudson .war file (hudson-3.0.1.war) and execute the following command:

java -jar hudson-3.0.1.war

It is not recommended to use this method of hosting Hudson in a production environment, but this method can be useful for quick and easy experimentation, and it will be the method used for most of the examples in this book.

The URL for Hudson using this installation method is:

http://localhost:8080

There are native packages for installing Hudson on different Linux distributions. These installations may be simpler and tightly integrated with the operating system (although installing and running an application server is fairly easy), but they are also less flexible and the native packages may not be up-to-date with the latest release of Hudson. For this reason, we will focus on deploying Hudson to different application servers.

Tomcat is an open source application server from the Apache Software Foundation. Tomcat implements the Java Servlet and JavaServer Pages specifications, which are part of the JEE (Java Enterprise Edition) specifications, specifically the web container. The latest version of the Tomcat is 7.0.42, and it will be used for the examples in this chapter.

The Tomcat application server can be downloaded from http://tomcat.apache.org/download-70.cgi.

Uncompress the Tomcat file in the ${HOME} directory on Linux systems or C: on Windows systems.

Set the TOMCAT_HOME environment variable and start Tomcat on Linux:

export TOMCAT_HOME=${HOME}/apache-tomcat-7.0.42
${TOMCAT_HOME}/bin/startup/sh

Set the TOMCAT_HOME environment variable and start Tomcat on Windows:

set TOMCAT_HOME=C:\apache-tomcat-7.0.42
%TOMCAT_HOME%\bin\startup.bat

Verify that Tomcat is running correctly by going to the following website:

http://localhost:8080/

You should see the following screenshot:

Deploying the Hudson web application to Tomcat can be as easy as copying the hudson-3.0.1.war file to the ${TOMCAT_HOME}/webapps directory. This uses the automatic deployment feature of Tomcat which, by default, uses part of the WAR filename to the left of .war as the context part of the URL. So our web address would be:

http://localhost:8080/hudson-3.0.1/

We want to get rid of the Hudson version number in the URL because this is kind of ugly. In order to change the context of the Hudson web application, we will explicitly define the context of the Hudson web application by creating the directory ${TOMCAT_HOME}/conf/Catalina/localhost and creating the file hudson.xml in this directory. We will store the Hudson WAR file in the ${HOME}/hudson/ directory on Linux and the C:\hudson directory on Windows. The contents of the hudson.xml file are:

<Context path="/hudson"

         docBase="/home/meinholz/hudson/hudson-3.0.1.war"

         reloadable="false">

&lt...

JBoss AS (Application Server) 7 is an open source application server from RedHat. JBoss AS 7 implements the JEE 6 specifications, which include the Java Servlet and JavaServer Pages specifications, as well as other parts of the JEE6 specification. The latest community version of the JBoss AS 7 server is 7.1.1 Final, and it will be used for the examples in this chapter.

The JBoss AS 7 application server can be downloaded from http://www.jboss.org/jbossas/downloads.

Decompress the JBoss AS 7 file in the ${HOME} directory on Linux systems or C: on Windows systems.

Set the JBOSS_HOME environment variable and create the JBoss AS 7 management user on Linux:

export JBOSS_HOME=${HOME}/jboss-as-7.1.1.Final
${JBOSS_HOME}/bin/add-user.sh

Set the JBOSS_HOME environment variable, and create the JBoss AS 7 management user on Windows:

set JBOSS_HOME=C:\jboss-as-7.1.1.Final%JBOSS_HOME%\bin\add-user.bat

For the add-user prompts, answer the following series of questions as...

JBoss AS 7 uses a graphical console for the deployment of web applications. On the JBoss AS 7 welcome page, click on the link to Administration Console, and provide the credentials you entered when you ran the add-user script. After you have logged in, you should be in the Runtime section of the server administration, and your screen should be similar to the following screenshot:

After the previous screenshot appears, follow these steps:

GlassFish is an open source application server from Oracle. GlassFish 4 implements the JEE specifications, which include the Java Servlet and JavaServer Pages specifications, as well as other parts of the JEE specification. The latest version of the GlassFish 4 server is 4.0, and it will be used for the examples in this chapter.

The GlassFish 4 application server can be downloaded from https://glassfish.java.net/download.html.

Download the ZIP (quick start) file.

Decompress the GlassFish 4 file in the ${HOME} directory on Linux systems or C: on Windows systems.

Set the GLASSFISH_HOME environment variable, and start GlassFish 4 on Linux:

export GLASSFISH_HOME=${HOME}/glassfish4
${GLASSFISH_HOME}/bin/asadmin start-domain

Set the GLASSFISH_HOME environment variable and start GlassFish 4 on Windows:

set GLASSFISH_HOME=C:\glassfish4%GLASSFISH_HOME%\bin\asadmin start-domain

Verify that GlassFish 4 is running correctly by going to the following website:

http://localhost...

There is an issue with GlassFish 4 CDI detection that causes the deployment of Hudson 3.0.1 to fail. This issue is discussed in the following forum entry:

http://www.eclipse.org/forums/index.php/t/490794/

The workaround suggested is to enter the following command:

${GLASSFISH_HOME}/bin/asadmin set configs.config.server-config.cdi-service.enable-implicit-cdi=false

This will allow the Hudson 3.0.1 WAR file to be deployed to the GlassFish 4 application server.

To deploy Hudson to GlassFish 4, follow these steps;

The GlassFish 4 Administration Console should look like the following screenshot:

The URL of Hudson is as follows:

http://localhost:8080/hudson/

The installation and setup of GlassFish 4 is now complete.

We have seen how Hudson can be run as a standalone application or deployed to common application servers. The examples will continue by running Hudson as a standalone application.

Having started the Hudson application as a standalone application, as described previously, we can now open a web browser and enter the following address in the URL:

http://localhost:8080/

The Hudson web application needs some initial setup. The first screen that you will see should be similar to the following screenshot:

For now, we won't select any plugins except Core Compatibility Plugins that are selected by default. Click on the Finish button at the bottom of the page. It will take a few minutes for Hudson to complete configuring itself. Once the initial configuration is complete, you should see the following screenshot:

Congratulations! Hudson is ready to go.

By default, the Hudson Home directory is ${HOME}/.hudson. It is possible to change the location of the Hudson Home directory by setting the HUDSON_HOME environment variable before starting the application server, or by setting the HUDSON_HOME system property or JNDI environment variable in your application server. For application server-specific documentation refer to:

http://wiki.eclipse.org/Containers

The most interesting item in the .hudson directory is the jobs directory. This will be the location of all the jobs that we will define during the course of this book.

In this chapter, we've run Hudson as a standalone application from the WAR file and shown how to deploy Hudson to three popular open source application servers, namely, Apache Tomcat, JBoss AS, and Glassfish. We have also seen where Hudson stores its configuration settings and job information. In the next chapter, we will configure and secure our Hudson 3 server.