Jenkins World 2019 lightning talk presented by Mark Waite, Aug 14, 2019 in San Francisco. Describes challenges, accomplishments, and lessons learned while adding Java 11 support to Jenkins

1. Lessons from
Platform Support
Adapting and Adopting

2. Lessons from
Platform Support
Adapting and AdoptingLightning Talk

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Lessons from Platform Support
Adapting and Adopting
• Java 11
• Windows
• Docker

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What is Jenkins?
• Most popular CI/CD tool in the world
• More than 250 000 active installations
• Open source
• Huge plugin ecosystem (1500+ plugins)

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Jenkins
Under the Hood
• Java
• XML
• Groovy
• Jetty
• …

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Begin the Race – Sep 2017 – May 2018
• Initial experiments
• Build projects that require Java 9+
• Jenkins won’t run with Java 9
• Pipeline won’t run
• Freestyle projects glitches
• Process management broken
• Maven project type not supported

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Worldwide Hackathon – June 2018
• 26 contributors
• Pipeline is working!
• Core and plugin patches submitted
• Development tools working
• Exploratory testing

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Java 11 Preview in Jenkins 2.155 – December 2018
• Weekly release with Java 11 support
• Most crucial plugins running and testing
• Build infrastructure tests Java 8 and Java 11, plugins and core
• On the road to long term support release!

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Java 11 support in Jenkins 2.164 LTS – March 2019
• Long term support release with Java 11 support
• Many more plugins running and testing
• Ready for production use

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Jenkins
One of the largest JVM-based projects
• Automation Framework (too flexible)
• 1500+ plugins
• 10+ years of compatibility
• 1500+ plugins
• Distributed remote execution
• Many, many dependencies

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Java 11 Dependency Updates
• Many, many dependencies
• ASM
• Jetty
• Groovy
• JBoss Marshalling
• JNR, JNA

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Java 9+ - No Longer Visible in Default Classloader
• XML – JAXB
• SQL
• Annotations - javax
• Activation – javax
• RMI – javax
• Tools – javax
• CORBA
• Several of these are widely used
• Alternatives explored with OpenJDK

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No more Java Web Start – Handling Windows Agents & more
• Agent startup from the web user interface

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Tool Upgrades for Java 11
• Latest maven releases
• Plugin and core parent POM’s
• Pipeline (Jenkinsfile) to build plugins
• Java 8 & Java 11
• Linux & Windows
• Jenkins Test Harness
• Acceptance Test Harness
• Plugin Compatibility Tester
• Replace findbugs with spotbugs
• Repair Javadoc for Java 11
• Update docker images for Java 11

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Windows Installer and Build Improvements
• Alex Earl (“slide”) efforts
• Remove 32 bit Java from installer
• Code signing on new installer
• Chocolatey package

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Platform skills?– Join the Platform SIG
• Platform SIG needs
• Java Developers
• Testers
• Writers
• Users – Windows, Linux, FreeBSD,
OpenBSD, zOS, zLinux, ARM, etc.
• https://jenkins.io/sigs/platform