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Using Appflow in Jenkins, GitLab CI, & GitHub Actions

For those who already use a CI/CD system like Jenkins, GitLab CI, & GitHub Actions you can easily integrate Appflow with those systems to do both live updates from them as well as native binary builds. Triggering native builds in particular can save you the headache of having to appropriately configure the OS, Xcode version, credentials, etc. Simply specify the configurations you'd like to use & let Appflow do the heavy lifting.

note

Building your native binaries in the cloud with Appflow requires a subscription to the Launch plan and above. Jenkins & GitLab CI integrations using the CLI is only available for the Scale plan. Our official GitHub Action is available free! 🚀 Sign up here.

GitHub Actions#

Appflow has it's very own GitHub Action that you can use to trigger builds. When you use the action you native binaries can be uploaded to GitHub as build artifacts so that you can easily access them. Since Appflow does the builds you don't need to run builds on any particular OS so don't worry about setting up & configure MacOS & codesigning Appflow can take care of that for you. You can read more about the action see the docs here.

The following is a sample github-workflow.yml file that will build iOS, Android, & Live Updates:

note

Remember to get your appflow token and set it using GitHub Secrets.

name: Build with Appflow
# Controls when the action will run. Triggers the workflow on push or pull request
# events but only for the master branch
on:
push:
branches: [ master ]
jobs:
# This will build an IPA & Upload the artifact in iOS.zip
build-ios:
runs-on: ubuntu-latest
steps:
- name: Build iOS with Appflow
uses: ionic-team/appflow-build@v1
with:
token: ${{ secrets.APPFLOW_TOKEN }}
app-id: yourappid
platform: iOS
build-type: ad-hoc
environment: MyEnv
native-config: MyNativeConfig
certificate: MyCertificate
build-stack: macOS - 2020.09
upload-artifact: iOS
# This will build an APK & Upload the artifact in Android.zip
build-android:
runs-on: ubuntu-latest
steps:
- name: Build Android with Appflow
uses: ionic-team/appflow-build@v1
with:
token: ${{ secrets.APPFLOW_TOKEN }}
app-id: yourappid
platform: Android
build-type: debug
environment: MyEnv
native-config: MyNativeConfig
upload-artifact: Android
# This will trigger a live update
build-live-update:
runs-on: ubuntu-latest
steps:
- name: Build Live Update with Appflow
uses: ionic-team/appflow-build@v1
with:
token: ${{ secrets.APPFLOW_TOKEN }}
app-id: yourappid
platform: Web
environment: MyEnv

Jenkins#

You can use the Ionic CLI to trigger builds from Jenkins as well. This can help save time having to setup agents on multiple OSs & managing dependencies. The Jenkinsfile below uses the Ionic CLI Docker Image as the container to run builds in. The container can run anywhere docker can run.

The following is a sample Jenkinsfile file that will build iOS, Android, & Live Updates:

note

Remember to get your appflow token and set it using Jenkins Credentials & load it into the IONIC_TOKEN environment variable.

pipeline {
agent any
environment {
IONIC_TOKEN = credentials('ionic-token')
}
stages {
stage('NPM Tests') {
agent {
docker {
image 'ghcr.io/ionic-team/ionic-cli:6.11.11'
args '-v $PWD:/usr/src/app/ -u 0:0'
}
}
steps {
sh 'npm ci'
sh 'npm run test'
}
}
stage('Build') {
parallel {
stage('Build Android') {
agent {
docker {
image 'ghcr.io/ionic-team/ionic-cli:6.11.11'
args '-v $PWD:/usr/src/app/ -u 0:0'
}
}
steps {
sh 'ionic package build android debug --environment="Jenkins" --native-config"=Jenkins" --build-file-name="Jenkins-$BUILD_ID.apk"'
}
post {
success {
archiveArtifacts artifacts: 'Jenkins-*.apk', fingerprint: true
}
}
}
stage('Build iOS') {
agent {
docker {
image 'ghcr.io/ionic-team/ionic-cli:6.11.11'
args '-v $PWD:/usr/src/app/ -u 0:0'
}
}
steps {
sh 'ionic package build ios ad-hoc --environment="Jenkins" --native-config"=Jenkins" --signing-certificate="Jenkins" --build-stack="macOS - 2020.09" --build-file-name="Jenkins-$BUILD_ID.ipa"'
}
post {
success {
archiveArtifacts artifacts: 'Jenkins-*.ipa', fingerprint: true
}
}
}
stage('Build Live Update') {
agent {
docker {
image 'ghcr.io/ionic-team/ionic-cli:6.11.11'
args '-v $PWD:/usr/src/app/ -u 0:0'
}
}
steps {
sh 'ionic deploy build --environment="Jenkins"'
}
}
}
}
}
}

GitLab CI#

You can use the Ionic CLI to trigger builds from GitLab CI as well. This can help save time having to setup GitLab Runners on multiple OSs & managing dependencies. The .gitlab-ci.yml below uses the Ionic CLI Docker Image as the container to run builds in. The container can run anywhere docker can run.

The following is a sample .gitlab-ci.yml file that will build iOS, Android, & Live Updates:

note

Remember to get your appflow token and set it using GitLab variables as IONIC_TOKEN variable.

image: ghcr.io/ionic-team/ionic-cli:6.11.11
stages:
- test
- build
test:
stage: test
script:
- npm ci
- npm run test
build-ios:
stage: build
script:
- ionic package build ios ad-hoc --environment="GitLab" --native-config"=GitLab" --signing-certificate="GitLab" --build-stack="macOS - 2020.09" --build-file-name="GitLab-$CI_PIPELINE_ID.ipa"
artifacts:
paths:
- GitLab-$CI_PIPELINE_ID.ipa
only:
- /^master$/
build-android:
stage: build
script:
- ionic package build android debug --environment="GitLab" --native-config"=GitLab" --build-file-name="GitLab-$CI_PIPELINE_ID.apk"
artifacts:
paths:
- GitLab-$CI_PIPELINE_ID.apk
only:
- /^master$/
build-live-update:
stage: build
script:
- ionic deploy build --environment="Jenkins"
only:
- /^master$/

Getting an Appflow Token#

You will need a token to authenticate with Appflow from your CI/CD System. The easiest way to get your token is to use the Ionic CLI to login & retrieve the token.

To login type:

npm i -g @ionic/cli
ionic login

Then you can use the following command to see your token:

ionic config get -g tokens.user

Prevent the CLI from invalidating the token:

ionic config unset -g tokens.refresh
ionic config unset -g tokens.user

When using the Ionic CLI you can login then using the token as an environment variable by setting it in you CI/CD system.

export IONIC_TOKEN=mytoken