Show a Jenkins pipeline stage as failed without failing the whole job - jenkins

Question

Here's the code I'm playing with
node {
stage 'build'
echo 'build'
stage 'tests'
echo 'tests'
stage 'end-to-end-tests'
def e2e = build job:'end-to-end-tests', propagate: false
result = e2e.result
if (result.equals("SUCCESS")) {
stage 'deploy'
build 'deploy'
} else {
?????? I want to just fail this stage
}
}
Is there any way for me to mark the 'end-to-end-tests' stage as failed without failing the whole job? Propagate false just always marks the stage as true, which is not what I want, but Propagate true marks the job as failed which I also don't want.

Answer 1

This is now possible, even with declarative pipelines:
pipeline {
agent any
stages {
stage('1') {
steps {
sh 'exit 0'
}
}
stage('2') {
steps {
catchError(buildResult: 'SUCCESS', stageResult: 'FAILURE') {
sh "exit 1"
}
}
}
stage('3') {
steps {
sh 'exit 0'
}
}
}
}
In the example above, all stages will execute, the pipeline will be successful, but stage 2 will show as failed:
As you might have guessed, you can freely choose the buildResult and stageResult, in case you want it to be unstable or anything else. You can even fail the build and continue the execution of the pipeline.
Just make sure your Jenkins is up to date, since this is a fairly new feature.

Answer 2

Stage takes a block now, so wrap the stage in try-catch. Try-catch inside the stage makes it succeed.
The new feature mentioned earlier will be more powerful. In the meantime:
try {
stage('end-to-end-tests') {
node {
def e2e = build job:'end-to-end-tests', propagate: false
result = e2e.result
if (result.equals("SUCCESS")) {
} else {
sh "exit 1" // this fails the stage
}
}
}
} catch (e) {
result = "FAIL" // make sure other exceptions are recorded as failure too
}
stage('deploy') {
if (result.equals("SUCCESS")) {
build 'deploy'
} else {
echo "Cannot deploy without successful build" // it is important to have a deploy stage even here for the current visualization
}
}

Answer 3

Sounds like JENKINS-26522. Currently the best you can do is set an overall result:
if (result.equals("SUCCESS")) {
stage 'deploy'
build 'deploy'
} else {
currentBuild.result = e2e.result
// but continue
}

Answer 4

I recently tried to use vaza's answer
Show a Jenkins pipeline stage as failed without failing the whole job as template for writing a function that excutes a job in an own stage named like the job name. Surprisingly it worked, but maybe some groovy experts have a look at it :)
Here is how it looks like if one of the jobs is aborted:
def BuildJob(projectName) {
try {
stage(projectName) {
node {
def e2e = build job:projectName, propagate: false
result = e2e.result
if (result.equals("SUCCESS")) {
} else {
error 'FAIL' //sh "exit 1" // this fails the stage
}
}
}
} catch (e) {
currentBuild.result = 'UNSTABLE'
result = "FAIL" // make sure other exceptions are recorded as failure too
}
}
node {
BuildJob('job1')
BuildJob('job2')
}

Answer 5

In order to show a successful build with a failed stage when a downstream job fails AND support a user being able to cancel a build (including all subsequent stages), I had to use a combination of various solutions, specifically when, try/catch, throw and catchError().
env.GLOBAL_BUILD_ABORTED = false // Set if the user aborts the build
pipeline {
agent any
stages {
stage('First Stage') {
when { expression { env.GLOBAL_BUILD_ABORTED.toBoolean() == false } }
steps {
catchError(buildResult: 'SUCCESS', stageResult: 'FAILURE') {
myLocalBuildMethod('Stage #1, build #1')
myLocalBuildMethod('Stage #1, build #2')
}
}
}
stage('Second Stage') {
when { expression { env.GLOBAL_BUILD_ABORTED.toBoolean() == false } }
steps {
catchError(buildResult: 'SUCCESS', stageResult: 'FAILURE') {
myLocalBuildMethod('Stage #2, build #1')
myLocalBuildMethod('Stage #2, build #2')
myLocalBuildMethod('Stage #2, build #3')
}
}
}
}
}
def myLocalBuildMethod(myString) {
/* Dummy method to show User Aborts vs Build Failures */
echo "My Local Build Method: " + myString
try {
build (
job: "Dummy_Downstream_Job"
)
} catch (e) {
/* Build Aborted by user - Stop All Test Executions */
if (e.getMessage().contains("was cancelled") || e.getMessage().contains("ABORTED")) {
env.GLOBAL_BUILD_ABORTED = true
}
/* Throw the execiption to be caught by catchError() to mark the stage failed. */
throw (e)
}
// Do other stuff...
}

Answer 6

You could add a explicit fail task, such as 'sh "not exist command"' in the stage.
if (result.equals("SUCCESS")) {
stage 'deploy'
build 'deploy'
} else {
try {
sh "not exist command"
}catch(e) {
}
}

Answer 7

Solution steps
You must emit an error in a stage to mark it as an error
Outside the scope of the stage, handle the exception and choose the build status
This makes the effect desired by a couple of users here, including myself, #user3768904, #Sviatlana
Success with failed Step Example
node("node-name") {
try {
stage("Process") {
error("This will fail")
}
} catch(Exception error) {
currentBuild.result = 'SUCCESS'
return
}
stage("Skipped") {
// This stage will never run
}
}
Aborted with failure Step Example
node("node-name") {
try {
stage("Process") {
error("This will fail")
}
} catch(Exception error) {
currentBuild.result = 'ABORTED'
return
}
stage("Skipped") {
// This stage will never run
}
}

Answer 8

You can use the following code in your else statement:
catchError(buildResult: 'SUCCESS', stageResult: 'FAILURE') {
error "some err msg"
}

Answer 9

This could be a general pattern showing how to customize the stage result with nice messages using the built-in functions and propagate the sub-job's result to the stage result. That the overall build is marked unstable if a sub-job is not successful is just a implementation choice for this example.
def run_sub_job() {
def jobBuild = build(job: 'foo', wait: true, propagate: false)
def result = jobBuild.getResult()
def msg = 'sub-job: ' + result
if ('SUCCESS' == result) {
println(msg)
} else if ('UNSTABLE' == result) {
unstable(msg) // will also set buildResult to UNSTABLE
} else { // anything else (FAILURE, ABORTED ...) is considered an error
catchError(
buildResult: 'UNSTABLE',
stageResult: result // propagate sub-job result
) {
error(msg)
}
}
}