Jenkins pipelineJob DSL not interpreting variables in pipeline script - jenkins

Question

I'm trying to generate Jenkins pipelines using the pipelineJob function in the jobDSL pluging, but cannot pass parameters from the DSL to the pipeline script. I have several projects that use what is essentially the same Jenkinsfile, with differences only in a few steps. I'm trying to use the JobDSL plugin to generate these pipelines on the fly, with the values I want changed in them interpreted to match the parameters to the DSL.
I've tried just about every combination of string interpretation that I can in the pipeline script, as well as in the DSL, but cannot get Jenkins/groovy to interpret variables in the pipeline script.
I'm calling the job DSL in a pipeline step:
def projectName = "myProject"
def envs = ['DEV','QA','UAT']
def repositoryURL = 'myrepo.com'
jobDsl targets: ['jobs/*.groovy'].join('\n'),
additionalParameters: [
project: projectName,
environments: envs,
repository: repositoryURL
],
removedJobAction: 'DELETE',
removedViewAction: 'DELETE'
The DSL is as follows:
pipelineJob("${project} pipeline") {
displayName('Pipeline')
definition {
cps {
script(readFileFromWorkspace(pipeline.groovy))
}
}
}
pipeline.groovy:
pipeline {
agent any
environment {
REPO = repository
}
parameters {
choice name: "ENVIRONMENT", choices: environments
}
stages {
stage('Deploy') {
steps {
echo "Deploying ${env.REPO} to ${params.ENVIRONMENT}..."
}
}
}
}
The variables that I pass in additionalParameters are interpreted in the jobDSL script; a pipeline with the correct name does get generated. The problem is that the variables are not passed to the pipeline script read from the workspace - the Jenkins configuration for the generated pipeline looks exactly the same as the file, without any interpretation on the variables.
I've made a number of attempts at getting the string to interpret, including a lot of variations of "${environments}", ${environments}, $environments, \$environments...I can't find any that work. I've also tried reading the file as a gstringImpl:
script("${readFileFromWorkspace(pipeline.groovy)}")
Does anyone have any ideas as to how I can make variables propagate down to the pipeline script? I know that I could just use a for loop to do string.replaceAll() on the script text, but that seems cumbersome; there's got to be a better way.

Answer 1

I've come up with a way to make this work. It's not what I'd prefer, which is having the string contents of the file implicitly interpreted during job creation, but it does work; it just adds an extra step.
import groovy.text.SimpleTemplateEngine
def fileContents = readFileFromWorkspace "pipeline.groovy"
def engine = new SimpleTemplateEngine()
template = engine.createTemplate(fileContents).make(binding.getVariables()).toString()
pipelineJob("${project} pipeline") {
displayName('Pipeline')
definition {
cps {
script(template)
}
}
}
This reads a file from your workspace, then uses it as a template with the binding variables. The other changes needed to make this work are escaping any variables used in your Jenkinsfile script, like \${VARIABLE} so that they are expanded at runtime, not at the time you build the job. Any variables you want to be expanded at job creation should be referenced as ${VARIABLE}.

Answer 2

You could achieve what you're trying to do by defining environment variables in the pipelineJob and then using those variables in your pipeline.
They are a bit limited because environment variables are strings, but it should work for basic stuff
Ex.:
//job-dsl
pipelineJob('example') {
environmentVariables {
// these vars could be specified by parameters of this job
env('repository', 'blah')
env('environments', "a,b,c"]) //comma separated string
}
displayName('Pipeline')
definition {
cps {
script(readFileFromWorkspace(pipeline.groovy))
}
}
}
}
And then in the pipeline:
//pipeline.groovy
pipeline {
agent any
environment {
REPO = env.repository
}
parameters {
choice name: "ENVIRONMENT", choices: env.environments.split(',')
//note the need to split the comma separated string above
}
}

Answer 3

You need to use the complete job name as a variable without the quotes. E.g., if JOBNAME is a parameter containing the entire job name:
pipelineJob(JOBNAME) {
displayName('Pipeline')
definition {
cps {
script(readFileFromWorkspace(pipeline.groovy))
}
}
}