[Box-Admins] Proposed week-long shutdown of Jenkins

[Ken Causey]

Let me just list the issues I'm aware of, not that these can all be 
fixed in the same way or require any significant overall downtime.

1. Jenkins broke some of our build processes with a release months ago. 
  Since that time we have been pinned to a specific release and have not 
updated.  Initially the plan was to be agile and keep up to date with 
Jenkins releases, but no one has found the time to figure out why the 
builds broke or at least the proper way to address the problem.  I know 
Frank tried but he has only so much time and other fish to fry.  I 
approached Chris C as he was the original instigator for Jenkins to try 
to see if he had the interest to help Frank out.

2. The issue I have harped on about in the past about filling up the 
filesystem on box3.  I'm convinced that Jenkins jobs are wasting space 
somewhere or that maybe there are some jobs that can be deleted?  I'm 
just speculating, but there are a number of jobs that have not succeeded 
in months.  By the way growth has been generally slow of late but we are 
at 97%, no immediate fear but 'vigilance!'.  If ultimately 
build.squeak.org is as big as it is because it has to be, then we 
probably need to approach SFC and see if there is budget to upgrade the 
disk space on box3.  That's not my first choice however.

3. The issue that Chris has referred to which is that we still get jobs 
stuck fairly regularly that have to be killed manually.

Ken

On 02/20/2014 11:11 AM, David T. Lewis wrote:
> What problem are we trying to solve here?
>
> If there are Jenkins jobs that cause problems, and if those problems
> cannot be addressed right away, then the appropriate thing to do is
> disable them using the normal Jenkins console. If an explanation is
> needed, just update the job description to say what is going on.
>
> A little bit of updating of the Jenkins job descriptions would do no harm
> in any case. Sort of like a class comment: "I am a Jenkins job that tests
> the FreebleBaz package. If I stop working, please contact
> bilbo at baggins.org".
>
> :)
>
> Dave
>
>> Ken and I have been thinking of shutting down Jenkins (OK, it was my idea)
>> for a week after 4.5 is released. The aim is to address hanging issues.
>>
>> A week is a long time from a technical point of view, but it allows people
>> using it to take a break. Mainly we're thinking of Frank here.
>> We're thinking of upgrades, disk usage, necessary and un-necessary builds
>> (if there are any). Basically stopping that world for a week.
>>
>> What do you think, Frank? If you are opposed, then we'll chuck this idea.
>>
>> Chris
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