Jenkins CI Automation for Unreal Engine 4 Projects

This tutorial and repository provides documentation and resources on how to configure a Jenkins CI installation to build and compile an Unreal Engine 4 project.

Created by Zack Devine for Skymap Games.

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Prerequisites

Before you begin: This documentation is solely meant for Jenkins running on Windows servers and desktops. This may also work on GNU/Linux build servers, however the included build scripts have only been tested for Windows installations.

To get started, please first download and install Jenkins on the computer you wish to use as a build server. (Jenkins Installation Docs)

Clone (or download) this repository to your CI server to access the required build files for the final steps of the tutorial.

You will also need to download cURL (only if posting notifications to Slack), Unreal Engine 4, as well as install MSBuild v14.0.

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Step 1: Create a new Jenkins Project

This first step is pretty straightforward. Once Jenkins is configured, start by creating a new Freestyle project.

General

Under General > Advanced check Use custom workspace and put the directory on the root of your drive, to prevent issues with long filenames during the build. Something like C:\Source\<project name> or similar should do the job.

Source Code Management

Set up your source control repository as normal.

Build Triggers

For our configuration, we poll the SCM every 3 minutes for changes, and build only if a certain keyword is present in the commit message. To do so, enter H/3 * * * * within the Schedule textbox. To trigger on commit messages, scroll back up to Source Code Management, click Advanced, and under Excluded Commit Messages enter ^((?!KEYWORD).)*$, replacing KEYWORD with your own keyword to check for.

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Step 2: Configure Build Scripts

Locate the directory where you downloaded the build scripts to. If you plan on posting to a Slack channel during the build process, you will need to configure an incomming webhook integration, and replace WEBHOOK_URL with the URL of the integration in PostToSlack.bat.

In each of the build scripts, make sure to replace PROJECT_NAME with the name of your project.

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Step 3: Add Build Steps to your Jenkins Project

Finally, add the build commands to Jenkins. At this point, you should have the build scripts somewhere on your server. Take note of the directory they reside in. For our setup, we post to a Slack channel during each step of the build. If you would also like to do this, make sure to include the PostToSlack.bat files during each step, as laid out below:

Make sure to replace C:\path\to\scripts\ with the actual path of your build scripts!

Build Step 1

call C:\path\to\scripts\PostToSlack.bat ":heavy_check_mark: Starting %JOB_NAME% Build -- Revision %SVN_REVISION%"
"C:\path\to\scripts\Step1_StartBuild.bat"

Build Step 2

call C:\path\to\scripts\PostToSlack.bat ":gear: Compiling game scripts..."
"C:\path\to\scripts\Step2_CompileScripts.bat"

Build Step 3

call C:\path\to\scripts\PostToSlack.bat ":hammer: Building project files..."
"C:\path\to\scripts\Step3_BuildFiles.bat"

Build Step 4

call C:\path\to\scripts\PostToSlack.bat ":fire: Cooking project..."
"C:\path\to\scripts\Step4_CookProject.bat"

Build Step 5 (Optional - Used to archive UE4 build)

call C:\path\to\scripts\PostToSlack.bat ":package: Archiving build..."
C:\path\to\scripts\Step5_Archive.bat "%SVN_REVISION%"

Build Step 6 (Optional - Notifies in Slack when project is complete)

C:\path\to\scripts\PostToSlack.bat ":tada: Done!"

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...and that should be it! Feel free to run a test build to see if everything builds and compiles correctly. The first build will take longer than normal, as Jenkins has to download all of the files from the repository specified.