Run Azure DevOps Private Agents in Kubernetes Clusters

Since in last post, we discussed on how to run Azure Pipelines agents as docker containers and configure them accordingly, the next step would be to run them on the Kubernetes platform. This kubernetes cluster can be on-premise and/or cloud and could be self managed or managed by the cloud service provider itself.

One of the reasons you may want to run them on Kubernetes is because you want better utilization of your kubernetes cluster. Another reason might be to leverage your existing knowledge of the kubernetes platform and work on it. Another reason would be to not use Microsoft hosted agents, as by default you would get only 1800 minutes of agent time to utilize, for free accounts.
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Running Azure DevOps private agents as docker containers

To run the build or deployment jobs in Azure DevOps or Azure Pipelines (formerly known as TFS and VSTS respectively), an agent is required. Microsoft provides the different types of the agents and they are hosted and managed by Microsoft only. However, it is advisable to host your own private agent for various reasons other than the cost. Microsoft provides the facility of installing agent on various OS’es like Windows, Linux, Mac OS etc. They have done a good job in terms of documentation, however you still need to perform few steps in order to set it up correctly.
Continue reading “Running Azure DevOps private agents as docker containers” →

Prevent the Continuous Integration build in Azure Pipelines after pushing commit

When configuring your Build Definitions on Azure Pipelines or on Azure DevOps server, you can configure a Continuous Integration (CI) build. A CI build runs for every checkin or commit that you make to source control. This allows you to start an automated process that for example compiles and deploys your build. This is a very useful process and it should be ideally setup in the above way. However there are times when you do not want the check-in to trigger a build at all. Continue reading “Prevent the Continuous Integration build in Azure Pipelines after pushing commit” →

Working with Tags in Git

To make proper git based workflows, one needs to learn both branching and tagging. While we have discussed git branches in depth in previous blog posts, we have avoided tags till now. Git tags are references that point to specific points in git history. Tagging is generally used to capture a point in the history that may be utilized in future to come back to. However, tags do not change from point, where they were created. So while branches move forward, tags do not. They represent static points in git history.

Some of the examples of tag might be like v0.1, v0.2 etc. Continue reading “Working with Tags in Git” →

Make git experience smoother using git aliases

Working with git can be a little intimidating for one since it requires a steep learning curve. Aliases are one of the ways to make git experience more familiar, simpler and easier. It is not necessary that one know them but then can often come handy. Also, you can probably save yourself some time if you also set aliases for long commands. In this short post, we’ll learn on how to use git aliases.

Before we dive into aliases, let’s review the configuration scope in git. Git has three scopes for configuration: Continue reading “Make git experience smoother using git aliases” →