Our latest FileUtils plugin for uDeploy expands our capabilities for updating XML configuration files per environment. It not lets you specify elements to update via XPath syntax and will update values, tweak attributes, remove or add children.
In other-words, tokenization isn’t needed anymore. Very cool stuff.
In other uDeploy news, 4.7 will be out August 8th. It’s getting environment gating (options to prevent entry to one environment without conditions being met), and a pile of enhancements around Configuration Management.
Urbancode is pleased to announce the release of a CollabNet TeamForge plugin for AnthillPro. The TeamForge integration allows AnthillPro to work with TeamForge like it does other bug and story trackers. AnthillPro can:
Create a list of TeamForge artifacts related to source changes
Comment on those artifacts providing a link from a artifact (defect, task, story) to a build
File new artifacts
TeamForge is more than a simple issue tracker though and provides neat features around release management. AnthillPro hooks into those release management features as well:
AnthillPro can create new TeamForge Releases
AnthillPro can upload codestation files (AP artifacts) to the TeamForge File Release System or upload a file to the FRS that links back to Anthill.
This integration was built against CollabNet 5.3 and is compatible with AnthillPro 3.7.3 as well as the 3.8 preview. Like AnthillPro, it is available for download on Supportal.
Today’s webinar Extending AnthillPro with Plugins is now available for replay. We had some great questions in Webinar that we want to cover here.
Q: Are you allowed to choose between different project types? (i.e. have multiple property plugins installed)
A: Yes. If you use project properties integrations to define common project settings, you can create several plugins and select from those when configuring a project. A project can use none, some or all of the plugin property groups.
Q: When I’m writing a plugin, can I use a language like Beanshell?
A: Sure. You can basically write plugin scripts in any language. Typically, scripting languages like Perl, VBScript, shell scripts, or Groovy are used, but the plugin system is language agnostic. You could even write a small application, package it in a plugin and invoke it.
Q: Do you have plugins or integrations for HP Quality Center?
A:Yes. We integrate with Quality Center both as a defect / issue tracker and as a tool for launching tests and gathering test results.
Does your company have a custom build and release process? Shouldn’t your build and release solution reflect your custom processes and toolsets?
With the release of AnthillPro 3.7, Urbancode introduced a new Plugin system. The Plugin system allows new AnthillPro step types, written in the scripting language of your choice (Groovy, Perl, Python, Ruby, etc). In addition to allowing for new integrations for commercial, open source, or in-house tools, Plugins can be used to expand existing integrations, standardize project configuration and solve unique automation challenges. More than a dozen Plugins are available from Urbancode today including: static analysis integrations, notifications to Twitter, builds with Ruby, data publishing to Sonar, issue tracking with Rally or TeamForge, and loading property file values in AnthillPro properties.
For AnthillPro users who want a custom fit to their process, and partners looking to add support for their tool to the AnthillPro platform, Jeffery Fredrick and Eric Minick invite you to join them on April 20th (or via recording) for this presentation where they will cover:
Finding, uploading and configuring existing Plugins
Plugin authoring: A brief how-to on writing Plugins
ahptool: the command line utility supporting Plugins
A Sonar plugin for AnthillPro is now available through Urbancode’s Supportal (support portal). This plugin pushes build generated metrics to the Sonar dashboard automatically when the build completes. When using Sonar, continuous integration builds can feed metrics over to Sonar. The same metrics are generally tracked on a per-build basis in AnthillPro as well.
Sonar is easiest to fit into your process if you are using Maven. However, the integration is designed to support non-Maven builds through the Sonar Light interface.
To kick off the new year, I put together a little plugin to address the age old problem: “Hey, how can I use my application’s property file settings to change AnthillPro’s behavior?” Ok, so most of you don’t have that problem. But some of you do and it’s a pain.
The ahptool command line widget available in 3.7 allows properties to be set from the agent but takes its input as an XML document. So we need to convert a property file like:
This could probably be done a number of ways, but I put together a little plugin that takes care of doing it in Groovy. Here’s a video showing the plugin in action and walking you through the code in case you want to do something similar.
I’m interested to know what other file formats teams are storing data in that should be read in like this. Adding some more options here, or allowing a number of properties files to be read in at once should be pretty easy to add.
