Official Jenkins Docker image

The Jenkins Continuous Integration and Delivery server.

This is a fully functional Jenkins server, based on the Long Term Support release http://jenkins-ci.org/

Usage

docker run -p 8080:8080 jenkins

This will store the workspace in /var/jenkins_home. All Jenkins data lives in there - including plugins and configuration. You will probably want to make that a persistent volume (recommended):

docker run -p 8080:8080 -v /your/home:/var/jenkins_home jenkins

This will store the jenkins data in /your/home on the host. Ensure that /your/home is accessible by the jenkins user in container (jenkins user - uid 102 normally - or use -u root).

You can also use a volume container:

docker run --name myjenkins -p 8080:8080 -v /var/jenkins_home jenkins

Then myjenkins container has the volume (please do read about docker volume handling to find out more).

Backing up data

If you bind mount in a volume - you can simply back up that directory (which is jenkins_home) at any time.

This is highly recommended. Treat the jenkins_home directory as you would a database - in Docker you would generally put a database on a volume.

If your volume is inside a container - you can use docker cp $ID:/var/jenkins_home command to extract the data. Note that some symlinks on some OSes may be converted to copies (this can confuse jenkins with lastStableBuild links etc)

Attaching build executors

You can run builds on the master (out of the box) buf if you want to attach build slave servers: make sure you map the port: -p 50000:50000 - which will be used when you connect a slave agent.

Here is an example docker container you can use as a build server with lots of good tools installed - which is well worth trying.

Passing JVM parameters

You might need to customize the JVM running Jenkins, typically to pass system properties or tweak heap memory settings. Use JAVA_OPTS environment variable for this purpose :

docker run --name myjenkins -p 8080:8080 -env JAVA_OPTS=-Dhudson.footerURL=http://mycompany.com jenkins

Installing more tools

You can run your container as root - and unstall via apt-get, install as part of build steps via jenkins tool installers, or you can create your own Dockerfile to customise, for example:

FROM jenkins
USER root # if we want to install via apt
RUN apt-get install -y ruby make more-thing-here
USER jenkins # drop back to the regular jenkins user - good practice

In such a derived image, you can customize your jenkins instance with hook scripts or additional plugins. Those need to be packaged inside the executed jenkins.war, so use :

RUM mkdir /tmp/WEB-INF/plugins
RUN curl -L https://updates.jenkins-ci.org/latest/git.hpi -o /tmp/WEB-INF/plugins/git.hpi
RUN curl -L https://updates.jenkins-ci.org/latest/git-client.hpi -o /tmp/WEB-INF/plugins/git-client.hpi
RUN cd /tmp; zip --grow /usr/share/jenkins/jenkins.war WEB-INF/* 

Also see JENKINS-24986

Upgrading

All the data needed is in the /var/jenkins_home directory - so depending on how you manage that - depends on how you upgrade. Generally - you can copy it out - and then "docker pull" the image again - and you will have the latest LTS - you can then start up with -v pointing to that data (/var/jenkins_home) and everything will be as you left it.

As always - please ensure that you know how to drive docker - especially volume handling!

Questions?

Jump on irc.freenode.net and the #jenkins room. Ask!