Brilliant Continuous Deployment

more screenshots

Overview

Strider is an Open Source Continuous Deployment / Continuous Integration platform. It is written in Node.JS / JavaScript and uses MongoDB as a backing store. It is published under the BSD license.

For more details, including features and more, check out the introductory chapter of the Strider Book

README Contents

• General requirements
• Docker quickstart
• Running on Infrastructure
  • Configuring
  • Adding Users
  • Starting Strider
  • Heroku
• Require()'ing Strider
• Extension & plugin guide
• Support & Help
• Roadmap / Changelog

General Requirements

• nodejs, v0.8 or v0.10
• mongodb (local or remote)
• git >= 1.7.10

Docker Quickstart

docker pull niallo/strider

For a fully self-contained and pre-built strider installation, check out the Strider Trusted Build.

There's a walkthrough of setting it up on our blog.

Running on Infrastructure

Make sure you have MongoDB installed on your system. You can get the latest version at mongodb.org.

Next you will need Node.JS. You can get binary packages for most platforms at nodejs.org.

Once you have Node.JS on your system, you can fetch & install all the dependencies for your Strider clone by executing the following command in the project root:

npm install

Configuring

Strider configuration comes from environment variables. Most of the default values should work fine for running on localhost, however for an Internet-accessible deployment the following variables will need to be exported:

• DB_URI : MongoDB DB URI if not localhost (you can safely use MongoLab free plan - works great)

• SERVER_NAME : Address at which server will be accessible on the Internet. E.g. https://strider.example.com (note: no trailing slash)

• PLUGIN_GITHUB_APP_ID, PLUGIN_GITHUB_APP_SECRET: Github app ID & secret (assuming not running on localhost:3000) - you can register a new one at https://github.com/settings/applications/new - the Main URL should be the same as server name above, and the callback URL should be server name with the path /auth/github/callback. E.g. https://strider.example.com/auth/github/callback

• PLUGIN_BITBUCKET_APP_KEY, PLUGIN_BITBUCKET_APP_SECRET, PLUGIN_BITBBUCKET_HOSTNAME: BitBucket app key, secret & server hostname. Needed if you're using BitBucket provider. More info at https://github.com/Strider-CD/strider-bitbucket.

• If you want email notifications, configure an SMTP server (we recommend Mailgun for SMTP if you need a server - free account gives 200 emails / day):

  • SMTP_HOST: SMTP server hostname e.g. smtp.example.com
  • SMTP_PORT: SMTP server port e.g. 587 (default)
  • SMTP_USER: SMTP auth username e.g. "myuser"
  • SMTP_PASS: SMTP auth password e.g. "supersecret"
  • SMTP_FROM: Default FROM address e.g. "Strider [email protected]" (default)

Adding Initial Admin User

Strider isn't much use without an account to login with. Once you create an administrative user, you can invite as many other people as you like to your instance. There is a simple CLI subcommand to help you create the initial user:

node bin/strider addUser

Example run:

$ node bin/strider addUser
Enter email []: [email protected]
Is admin? (y/n) [n]: y
Enter password []: *******

Email:		[email protected]
Password:	****
isAdmin:	true
OK? (y/n) [y]:
22 Oct 21:21:01 - info: Connecting to MongoDB URL: mongodb://localhost/strider-foss
22 Oct 21:21:01 - info: User added successfully! Enjoy.

Starting Strider

Once Strider has been installed and configured, it can be started with:

node bin/strider

Strider on Heroku

To get up and running quickly on Heroku, you can simply use the button above. If you run into any issues, you can deploy manually with the steps below.

heroku create
heroku addons:add mongolab
git push heroku master
heroku open

If you want support for languages other than Node.js and Python, you'll need to set the buildpack for your app. Currently this enables support for Ruby 2.0.0.

heroku config:add BUILDPACK_URL=https://github.com/ddollar/heroku-buildpack-multi.git

Require()'ing Strider

Strider can be require()-ed like any other NPM module. This is particularly useful when you want to

• Make Strider a dependency at a specific version
• Choose exactly which plugins to install
• Customize configuration
• Do other crazy stuff

For example, you could have a project with its own package.json that depends on strider at a specific version, along with any other extensions you choose loaded from a particular filesystem location. Then you could write a simple initialization shim like the following:

var strider = require('strider')

var instance = strider("/path/to/extensions/dir", config, function(err, initialized, appInstance) {
    console.log("Strider is now running")
})

Extending & Customizing Strider

Strider is extremely customizable and extensible through plugins. Plugins can add hooks to perform arbitrary actions during build. They can modify the database schema to add custom fields. They can also register their own HTTP routes. Even the front-end is highly customizable through template extensions.

For documentation on extending Strider, see strider-extension-loader's README.

Resources

• Strider on DigitalOcean - Covers setting up an Ubuntu machine with Strider using upstart.
• Strider plugin template - Simple setup for getting started with your own plugin.
• Panamax Strider template - Strider template for use with Panamax.

Support & Help

IRC: irc.freenode.net #strider

We are very responsive to Github Issues - please think of them as a message board for the project!

Strider is maintained and supported by FrozenRidge, LLC. For commercial support, customization, integration & hosting enquiries please email [email protected].