Dynamically Fill Jenkins Choice Parameter With Git Branches In a Specified Repo

Question

I have a parameterized Jenkins job which requires the input of a specific Git branch in a specific Git repo   Currently this parameter is a string parameter   Is there any way to make this parameter a choice parameter and dynamically fill the drop down list with the Git branches   I don t want to require someone to maintain this choice parameter by manually configuring the drop down every time a new branch is created

User · Answer

I tried a couple of answers mentioned in this link, but couldn't figure out how to tell Jenkins about the user-selected branch. As mentioned in my previous comment in above thread, I had left the branch selector field empty.

But, during further investigations, I found another way to do the same thing - https://wiki.jenkins-ci.org/display/JENKINS/Git+Parameter+Plugin I found this method was a lot simpler, and had less things to configure!

Here's what I configured -

Installed the git parameter plugin
Checked the 'This build is parameterized' and added a 'Git parameter'
Added the following values:
Then in the git SCM section of the job I added the same value mentioned in the 'Name' section, as if it were an environment variable. (If you read the help for this git parameter plugin carefully, you will realize this)

After this I just ran the build, chose my branch(Jenkins checks out this branch before building) and it completed the build successfully, AND by choosing the branch that I had specified.

User · Answer

I was able to achieve this result using the Jenkins Dynamic Parameter Plug-in  I used the Dynamic Choice Parameter option and  for the choices script  I used the following   proc1      bin bash    -c     usr bin git ls-remote -h ssh   user server com path to repo git   execute   proc2      bin bash    -c    awk   print   2     execute   proc3      bin bash    -c    sed s  refs heads origin    execute    all   proc1   proc2   proc3 String result   all text  String filename     tmp branches txt  boolean success   new File filename  write result    def multiline    cat  tmp branches txt  execute   text def list   multiline readLines

User · Answer

The following groovy script would be useful  if your job does not use  Source Code Management  directly  likewise  Git Parameter Plugin    but still have access to a local  cloned  git repository   import jenkins model Jenkins  def envVars   Jenkins instance getNodeProperties   0  getEnvVars    def GIT PROJECT PATH   envVars get  GIT PROJECT PATH    def gettags    git ls-remote -t --heads origin  execute null  new File GIT PROJECT PATH    return gettags text readLines             collect   it split   1  replaceAll                  replaceAll  refs   w                      unique     See full explanation here  https   stackoverflow com a 37810768 658497

User · Answer

Its quite simple using the  Git Parameter Plug-in    Add Name like  SELECT BRANCH       Make sure for this variable as this would be used later  Then Parameter Type   Branch   Then reach out to SCM   Select   Git and branch specifier     SELECT BRANCH   To verify  execute below in shell in jenkins   echo   SELECT BRANCH   env enter image description here

User · Answer

I m aware to the fact that in the original question Jenkins pipeline was not mentioned  but if it is still applicable  using it   I find this solution easy to maintain and convenient  This approach describe the settings required to compose a Jenkins pipeline that  quot polls quot   list  dynamically all branches of a particular repository  which then lets the user run the pipeline with some specific branch when running a build of this job  The assumptions here are   The Jenkins server is 2 204 2  hosted on Ubuntu 18 04  The repository is hosted in a BitBucket   First thing to do is to provide Jenkins credentials to connect  and  quot fetch quot   to the private repository in BitBucket  This can be done by creating an SSH key pair to  quot link quot  between the Jenkins      user on the machine that hosts the Jenkins server and the  private  BitBucket repository   First thing is to create an SSH key to the Jenkins user  which is the user that runs the Jenkins server - it is most likely created by default upon the installation   guya ubuntu jenkins    sudo su jenkins   sudo  password for guya  jenkins ubuntu jenkins  home guya  ssh-keygen  The output should look similar to the following     Generating public private rsa key pair  Enter file in which to save the key   var lib jenkins  ssh id rsa   Created directory   var lib jenkins  ssh   Enter passphrase  empty for no passphrase   Enter same passphrase again  Your identification has been saved in  var lib jenkins  ssh id rsa  Your public key has been saved in  var lib jenkins  ssh id rsa pub  The key fingerprint is  SHA256 q6PfEthg 74QFwO esLbOtKbwLG1dhtMLfxIVSN8fQY jenkins ubuntu jenkins The key s randomart image is   --- RSA 2048 ----         o E           o    o       o   o       oo       ooX  S        Bo          oo  o            o        o        ---- SHA256 -----  jenkins ubuntu jenkins  home guya    Now the content of this SSH key needs to be set in the BitBucket repository as follows    Create  add  an SSH key in the BitBucket repository by going to  Settings -- gt  Access keys -- gt  Add key  Give the key Read permissions and copy the content of the PUBLIC key to the  quot body quot  of the key  The content of the key can be displayed by running  cat  var lib jenkins  ssh id rsa pub   After that the SSH key was set in the BitBucket repository  we need to  quot tell quot  Jenkins to actually USE it when it tries to fetch  read in this case  the content of the repository  NOTE that by letting Jenkins know  actually means let user jenkins this  quot privilege quot    This can be done by adding a new   SSH User name with private key to the Jenkins -- gt  Credentials -- gt  System -- gt  Global Credentials -- gt  Add credentials   In the ID section put any descriptive name to the key  In the Username section put the user name of the Jenkins server which is jenkins  Tick the Private key section and paste the content of the PRIVATE key that was generated earlier by copy-paste the content of     ssh id rsa  This is the private key which start with the string -----BEGIN RSA PRIVATE KEY----- and ends with the string  -----END RSA PRIVATE KEY-----  Note that this entire  quot block quot  should be copied-paste into the above section    Install the Git Parameter plugin that can be found  in its official page here  The very minimum pipeline that is required to list  dynamically  all the branches of a given repository is as follows  pipeline         agent any parameters                gitParameter branchFilter   origin        defaultValue   master   name   BRANCH   type   PT BRANCH             stages                stage  quot list all branches quot                         steps                                git branch   quot   params BRANCH  quot   credentialsId   quot SSH user name with private key quot   url   quot ssh   git myCompanyBitBucketSite com port myRepository git quot                                     NOTES   The defaultValue is set to master so that if no branches exist - it will be displayed in the  quot drop list quot  of the pipeline  The credentialsId has the name of the credentials configured earlier  In this case I used the SSH URL of the repository in the url parameter  This answer assumes  and configured  that the git server is BitBucket  I assume that all the  quot administrative quot  settings done in the initial steps  have their equivalent settings in GitHub

User · Answer

Extended Choice Parameter plugin will allow you to read the choices from a file   Of course  now you have another problem  how to make sure the file is up-to-date  that can be done with a post-commit hook  and propagated to all the users  that can be done by placing it on a shared file server   But there may be better solutions

User · Answer

You can accomplish the same using the extended choice parameter plugin before mentioned by malenkiy scot and a simple php script as follows assuming you have somewhere a server to deploy php scripts that you can hit from the Jenkins machine    lt  php chdir   path to repo    exec  git branch -r    output   print  branches   str replace    origin      implode       output       gt    or   lt  php exec  git ls-remote -h http   user pass repo git    output   print  branches   preg replace    a-z0-9   trefs  heads        implode       output       gt    With the first option you would need to clone the repo  With the second one you don t  but in both cases you need git installed in the server hosting your php script  Whit any of this options it gets fully dynamic  you don t need to build a list file  Simply put the URL to your script in the extended choice parameter  property file  field

User · Answer

I have a new response for this case  the easy way to solve this is having you jenkinsFile from source code    Then you chose  this job have a git parameter    And and the Pipeline setup  unchecked the  Lightweight checkout  checkbox  this will perform a really git checkout on job workspace      After  the parameter will be autopopulate by your git branch

User · Answer

expanding on  malenkiy scot s answer  I created a new jenkins job to build up the file that is used by Extended Choice Plugin   you can do the following  I did it as execute shell steps in jenkins  but you could do it in a script    git ls-remote git github com my repo git  grep refs heads    gt tmp txt sed -e  s   refs  heads      tmp txt  gt  tmp2 txt tr   n       lt  tmp2 txt  gt  tmp3 txt sed  1i branches   tmp3 txt  gt  tmp4 txt tr -d   n    lt  tmp4 txt  gt  branches txt   I then use the Artifact deployer plugin to push that file to a shared location  which is in a web url  then just use  http   localhost branches txt  in the Extended Choice plugin as the url   works like a charm

User · Answer

For Me I use the input stage param    I start my pipeline by checking out the git project  I use a awk commade to generate a barnch txt file with list of all branches In stage setps  i read the file and use it to generate a input choice params   When a user launch a pipeline  this one will be waiting him to choose on the list choice   pipeline  agent any  stages       stage  checkout scm             steps               script                  git credentialsId   8bd8-419d-8af0-30960441fcd7   url   ssh   jenkins git company com  usr company repositories repo git                  sh  git branch -r   awk    print  1    ORS     n    gt  gt branch txt                                      stage  get build Params User Input             steps              script                   liste   readFile  branch txt                  echo  please click on the link here to chose the branch to build                  env BRANCH SCOPE   input message   Please choose the branch to build    ok   Validate                            parameters   choice name   BRANCH NAME   choices     liste    description   Branch to build                                          stage  checkout the branch            steps              echo    env BRANCH SCOPE               git  credentialsId   ea346a50-8bd8-419d-8af0-30960441fcd7   url   ssh   jenkins git company com usr company repositories repo git              sh  git checkout -b build   env BRANCH NAME                       stage   exec maven build            steps              withMaven maven   M3   mavenSettingsConfig   mvn-setting-xml                    sh  mvn clean install                                     stage  clean workwpace            steps              cleanWs                          And then user will interact withim the build    enter image description here  enter image description here

User · Answer

We can eliminate the unnecessary file read write by using text  My complete solution is the following   proc1      bin bash    -c        usr bin git ls-remote --heads ssh   repo url git   execute   proc2      bin bash    -c        usr bin awk     gsub  refs   heads             print   2       execute   all   proc1   proc2  choices   all text return choices split   toList

User · Answer

Yes  I wrote a little groovy script which does the trick You should add a  Dynamic Choice Parameter  to your job and customize the following groovy script to your needs       usr bin groovy  def gitURL    git repo url  def command    git ls-remote --heads --tags   gitURL    def proc   command execute   proc waitFor                  if   proc exitValue      0        println  Error    proc err text      System exit -1     def text   proc in text   put your version string match def match     lt REGEX gt   def tags       text eachMatch match    tags push it 1     tags unique   tags sort    a  b - gt           def a1   a tokenize    -            def b1   b tokenize    -            try               for  i in 1   lt  a1 size    b1 size    min                        if  a1 i  toInteger      b1 i  toInteger    return a1 i  toInteger    lt   gt  b1 i  toInteger                             return 1            catch  e                return -1                 tags reverse     I my case the version string was in the following format X X X X and could have user branches in the format X X X-username  etc    So I had to write my own sort function  This was my first groovy script so if there are better ways of doing thing I would like to know

User · Answer

I am facing a similar problem here   Our users are migrating their jobs from freestyle to pipeline  They do not want Jenkinsfile stored in their repos historical reason  and still want to use  Git Parameter  plugin  So we have to use use  Pipeline script  and develop a different plugin which works like  Git Parameter     This new plugin does not integrate with SCM setting in the project  The plugin is at https   plugins jenkins io list-git-branches-parameter  Hope it helps you as well

User · Answer

You may try this  This list dynamic branch names in dropdown w r t inputted Git Repo  Jenkins Plugins required   Validating String Parameter Active Choices   OPTION 1  Jenkins File      properties             class   JobRestrictionProperty    parameters  validatingString defaultValue   https   github com kubernetes kubernetes git   description   Input Git Repo  https  Url   failedValidationMessage   Invalid Git Url  Retry again   name   GIT REPO   regex   https           class   CascadeChoiceParameter   choiceType   PT SINGLE SELECT   description   Select Git Branch Name   filterLength  1  filterable  false  name   BRANCH NAME   randomName   choice-parameter-8292706885056518   referencedParameters   GIT REPO   script    class   GroovyScript   fallbackScript   classpath      sandbox  false  script   return   Error - Unable to retrive Branch name       script   classpath      sandbox  false  script                                  def GIT REPO SRC   GIT REPO tokenize                                    GIT REPO FULL   GIT REPO SRC -2            GIT REPO SRC -1                              def GET LIST     quot git ls-remote --heads git github com   GIT REPO FULL  quot   execute                               GET LIST waitFor                               BRANCH LIST   GET LIST in text readLines   collect                                   it split   1  replaceAll  quot refs heads  quot    quot  quot   replaceAll  quot refs tags  quot    quot  quot   replaceAll  quot                 quot    quot  quot                                                             return BRANCH LIST                                        throttleJobProperty categories      limitOneJobWithMatchingParams  false  maxConcurrentPerNode  0  maxConcurrentTotal  0  paramsToUseForLimit                                   throttleEnabled  false  throttleOption                                project       class                                JobLocalConfiguration    changeReasonComment                                         try           node  master                 stage  Print Variables                     echo  quot Branch Name    BRANCH NAME  quot                          catch  e            currentBuild result    quot FAILURE quot          print e getMessage            print e getStackTrace            OPTION 2  Jenkins UI     Sample Output

[git] Dynamically Fill Jenkins Choice Parameter With Git Branches In a Specified Repo

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