Pipelines Topics

Getting Started with Azure Pipelines

Azure Pipelines is a cloud service that you can use to automate building, testing, and deploying your code to any cloud or on-premises. It's a core part of Azure DevOps, providing powerful CI/CD capabilities.

This section covers the fundamental concepts and practical steps to create and manage your first pipelines.

Understanding YAML Pipelines

Modern Azure Pipelines are primarily defined using YAML. This approach treats your pipeline definition as code, allowing for versioning, collaboration, and reusability.

A typical YAML pipeline includes triggers, agent pools, stages, jobs, and steps (tasks).

pipeline: azure-pipelines.yml trigger: - main pool: vmImage: 'ubuntu-latest' stages: - stage: Build displayName: Build the application jobs: - job: BuildJob displayName: Build job steps: - script: echo Building... displayName: Run a one-line script - script: | echo This is a multi-line script. echo It can execute several commands. displayName: Run a multi-line script

YAML pipelines offer flexibility and enable infrastructure-as-code principles for your CI/CD processes.

Creating Your First Build Pipeline

A build pipeline compiles your source code, runs tests, and produces artifacts that can be deployed.

Steps:

  1. Navigate to the Pipelines section in your Azure DevOps project.
  2. Click "Create Pipeline".
  3. Select your code repository (e.g., Azure Repos Git, GitHub).
  4. Choose a template or start with an existing YAML file.
  5. Configure your build steps, such as compiling code, running unit tests, and publishing artifacts.
  6. Save and run your pipeline.
Tip: Azure Pipelines can automatically suggest a YAML structure based on your repository's contents.

Introduction to Release Pipelines

Release pipelines automate the deployment of your application to various environments (e.g., Dev, QA, Production). They orchestrate the release process, including approvals and gates.

Release pipelines are often associated with artifacts produced by build pipelines.

Implementing Continuous Integration (CI)

CI is the practice of frequently merging code changes into a central repository, after which automated builds and tests are run.

Key components of CI in Azure Pipelines include:

  • Triggers: Automatically start a pipeline on code commits.
  • Build Agents: Machines that execute your pipeline jobs.
  • Artifacts: The output of your build, ready for deployment.

CI helps catch integration issues early and ensures a stable codebase.

Implementing Continuous Delivery/Deployment (CD)

CD extends CI by automating the entire software release process. It ensures that code changes can be deployed to production reliably and quickly.

Azure Pipelines supports both Continuous Delivery (manual approval for production deployment) and Continuous Deployment (fully automated deployment).

Release pipelines are the primary tool for CD, allowing you to define deployment stages, pre- and post-deployment approvals, and integration with external services.

Understanding Stages, Jobs, and Tasks

Pipelines are structured hierarchically:

  • Stages: Represent a major division of the pipeline, such as Build, Test, or Deploy. Stages run sequentially by default but can be configured for parallel execution.
  • Jobs: A set of steps that execute on a specific agent. Jobs within a stage can run in parallel or sequentially.
  • Tasks: The smallest unit of work in a pipeline, performing a specific action like compiling code, running a script, or publishing an artifact.

This structure provides a clear and organized way to define complex CI/CD workflows.