CI Pipelines

Pipelines in ALM Octane represent the jobs or steps that run on your CI server. ALM Octane incorporates data from your pipelines into your application delivery process, helping you analyze quality, progress, change impact, code coverage and more.

Pipelines overview

After you set up ALM Octane to integrate with your continuous integration (CI) server, you can create pipelines in ValueEdge and ALM Octane. For details, see Set up CI/CD integration.

Pipelines represent the flow of your CI server jobs. If you are working with Jenkins, Bamboo, or GoCD, the graphical representation of the pipeline also shows the hierarchy of the jobs in the flow.

When you run pipelines after adding them to ALM Octane, ALM Octane collects build, test run, and commit information from the pipeline run.

Using pipelines in ALM Octane, you can: 

Action Where? Comments
Collect pipeline run and automated test run results from the CI server.

Pipelines > Pipelines tab

View a summary of the pipeline run details, test run statistics, a graphical representation of the pipeline steps' flow, and more.
Configure test properties and environment data on pipeline steps that run automated tests.

Inside a pipeline: Topology tab

You can later filter the test run results based on this data, in the Tests tab (Quality or Backlog module).

Track and analyze build results.

Pipelines > Pipelines tab

Inside a pipeline run: Builds tab

View a summary or breakdown of build results, as well as suggested reasons for failures and areas that need attention. Assign failures to users for investigation, and use build failure classification to share investigation conclusions.
Include automated test run results in product and release quality analysis. Dashboards and Overviews throughout ALM Octane Requires assigning automated tests to application modules (Settings > DevOps > Test Assignment Rules) or backlog items.
Track commits associated with specific build runs and specific user stories and defects.

Pipelines > Pipelines tab

Team Backlog

Inside stories or pipeline runs

Additional customization in Settings > DevOps page.

Requires working with a CI server that integrates with an SCM system. For details, see Track changes committed to your Source Control Management system.

Track security issues discovered in your code

Pipelines > Pipelines tab

Inside a pipeline run: Vulnerabilities tab

Requires working with a Jenkins server that integrates with a security testing tool such as Fortify, Fortify on Demand or SonarQube. For details, see Track security vulnerabilities.
Code coverage: Track how much of your code is covered by automated tests

Pipelines > Pipelines tab: Dashboard

Inside a pipeline: Runs tab

Requires integration with a Jenkins server with JaCoCo or LCOV code coverage reports. For details, see Track code coverage in pipeline runs.

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How ValueEdge and ALM Octane builds a pipeline's topology

When you add a pipeline, you specify a job on the CI server to use for the root of the pipeline. ALM Octane then follows your pipeline structure, and builds a visual representation of the pipeline.

  • The pipeline's structure is dynamic. If additional jobs are added in the CI server after you created the pipeline in ALM Octane, these steps are added the next time the pipeline runs.

  • If the pipeline runs jobs that ValueEdge and ALM Octane did not initially detect as part of the pipeline, they are added to the pipeline during the run.

In both cases, the new steps are visible the next time you open the pipeline.

Tip: A step that no longer runs as part of the pipeline flow is not removed from the pipeline. If, over time, the pipeline structure displayed in the Topology tab is no longer helpful, click . This instructs ALM Octane to redraw the topology based on the current pipeline steps defined on your CI server.

If you change the CI server, make sure that the pipeline is not being duplicated. If this is happening, click to redraw the topology.

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Displaying pipelines in ALM Octane

In ALM Octane, in the Pipelines module, you can see all the pipelines that are being tracked, and filter to see the ones that interest you.

After a pipeline runs ValueEdge and ALM Octane displays information about the pipeline run status, its run history, related code changes, affected application modules, and more. You can also find analytic information about failed tests and tools to help you analyze the pipeline run results.

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