CI Factory
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As you know, I’m working with the Subtext project. Subtext uses CruiseControl.NET (CC.NET) as it’s continuous integration (CI) build system. One of the nice features of CC.NET is the web dashboard that provides the visibility in to the builds. Over the last month, I have been upgrading the Subtext dashboard with a new look and feel as well as some additional features. As a result, the dashboard caught the attention of Jay Flowers, who owns the CI Factory project.
For those of you who don’t know about CI Factory, it is a turnkey solution to provide a working CI server in just a few minutes. It’s a great concept that removes a lot of the complex work of setting up CC.NET and creating custom NAnt build scripts. The other nice thing about CI Factory is that it can be pretty easily extended by adding new Packages. A package is essentially a self-contained CI Factory extension that adds functionality for one specific technology. Right now, CI Factory comes with the following packages as part of the install:
- Visual Source Safe
- Subversion
- PVCS Tracker
- .NET Visual Studio 2003/2005 solution compilation
- Unit Test execution with MbUnit
- Code Coverage with CoverageEye
- nDepend
- Deployment artifact publication
- InstallShield or VS Deployment packages
- Assembly and product version
There are also third-party packages available for:
- Ant
- VB6 Compile
- Lines of Code
- MSTest
- NCover
- Backup
- Simian
- Analytics
Since CI Factory is built on top of CC.NET, it also offers a web dashboard. Jay and I have started discussions regarding enhancing the CI Factory dashboard to give it a custom look and feel that matches the CI Factory website look and possibly extending the customizations to a few pre-defined looks to choose from. It’s all in the very early stages of discussion, but it should help make an already good product even more appealing.