What Is CI/CD

CI/CD is a set of practices that automates software integration, testing, and release. It helps teams ship changes safely and frequently.

Continuous Integration

Continuous Integration means developers frequently merge code into a shared branch. Each merge triggers automated builds and tests.

This catches defects early and keeps the main branch deployable.

Continuous Delivery vs Continuous Deployment

  • Continuous Delivery: releases are prepared automatically, but production deploy needs approval
  • Continuous Deployment: every passing change is deployed automatically to production

Both models reduce manual steps and improve consistency.

Pipeline Stages

  • Source: commit and trigger
  • Build: compile/package artifact
  • Test: run unit/integration/security checks
  • Release: version and publish artifact
  • Deploy: roll out to staging/production
  • Observe: monitor health and rollback if needed

Tools: Jenkins and GitHub Actions

Jenkins is widely used for customizable pipelines. GitHub Actions is native to GitHub repositories and easy to adopt.

# GitHub Actions example trigger
on:
push:
branches: [ main ]

Build Your First Pipeline

Start with one app, automate tests, and then automate deployment safely.

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