Change of Course

Jenkins 2 Reloaded

Although it will not be usable at first and later only on certain platforms, Jenkins 2 will work in the usual way, with a few changes. To develop it faster in the future and achieve greater stability, however, the developers are willing to drop some components. At the same time, reorientation requires changes to the development model.

The new release model will be based on Jenkins Evergreen; it will inevitably "disappoint expectations," especially in terms of compatibility. Jenkins will no longer be "compatible forever." The Java project keeps the option open for disruptive changes. If this requires major versions more frequently, Kawaguchi is open to them. In doing so, he is orienting his actions on the modified development model for Java SE, which picked up speed after restructuring.

Of course, the inconvenience of upgrading Jenkins needs to pay off for users at the end of the day. The project will remain largely compatible to protect existing job definitions and freestyle jobs. However, this apparently only applies to existing versions of Jenkins.

Also Ran

Developers are also looking to focus more on Configuration as Code, improve the developer experience by automatically detecting project types, and further optimize the Jenkins pipeline. At the end of the rebuild, Jenkins 2 also should work well with CNJ.

The Jenkins makers also plan to reduce the "feature interface" and thus focus on the essential components. The project wants to discover which services users actually need and what competitors offer. Missing or dropped components could then be supplied by Jenkins.

In the long run, Cloud Native Jenkins will also have a less extensive graphical user interface thanks to the use of JCasC, but the project will probably want to implement this as a separate app and not as a plugin. The existing Blue Ocean user interface [7] could serve as a template for the new user interface.