CI/CD

Continuous Integration (CI) is the practice of merging every developer's working copy into a shared mainline several times a day, with each merge verified by an automated build and test suite. Continuous Delivery (CD) extends this by ensuring the codebase is always in a deployable state, while Continuous Deployment takes it one step further by automatically releasing every passing change to production.

A typical CI/CD pipeline runs through stages: code is pushed to version control, a build server compiles it and runs unit tests, integration tests verify component interactions, and deployment steps push artifacts to staging or production environments. Container technologies like Docker ensure consistent environments across all stages. The primary benefit is fast, reliable feedback.

Open-source CI/CD platforms:

Woodpecker CI — community fork of Drone (pre-license-change). Container-native pipelines with simple YAML config. No feature gating. Apache 2.0.

Jenkins — the veteran. Extensible with hundreds of plugins. Declarative or scripted pipelines via Jenkinsfile. No feature gating. MIT.

Gitea — self-hosted Git forge with built-in Actions (GitHub Actions-compatible). Core is fully open; separate enterprise edition exists. MIT.

GoCD — by ThoughtWorks. Pipeline-first design with value stream maps for complex deployment workflows. No feature gating. Community-maintained since 2021. Apache 2.0.