Buildbot is a software development continuous integration tool that automates the compile/test cycle required by most software projects to validate code changes. Initially it was developed as a light-weight alternative to the Firefox project's Tinderbox, but software grew with time and now its flexibility and power are used by a number of high-profile open-source projects such as Chromium, WebKit, Mozilla, etc.
Automation is very useful in software development. Automated development processes can be repeatable, frequent (depending on available resources) and, as a result, more reliable. When deployment is automated - it is predictable, thus less risky. The same goes for testing, quality-assurance checks, and releasing packages. Buildbot can take care of all repeatable processes.
Buildbot provides distributed, parallel execution of jobs across multiple platforms and flexible integration with version-control systems. This software quickly and efficiently finds build issues by automatically rebuilding and testing the tree each time something has changed. It is not just continuous-integration testing. Buildbot provides automation of complex build systems, application deployment, and management of sophisticated software-release processes. Buildbot has extensive status reporting and widely supports SCM integration, specifically with SVN, CVS, Git, Bazaar, Repo, Darcs, Perforce, BitKeeper, Mercurial, and Monotone.
Buildbot is written in Python on top of the Twisted libraries and is compatible with all major operating systems. Using Python’s full expressive power there is opportunity to use dynamic generation of configuration, customized components, and much more. Buildbot’s design allows your installation to be customized according to your needs and grow together with the project.
Basically, Buildbot is a job scheduling system: it creates job queues, executes them according to available resources, and reports back the results. Buildbot installation is built in the following way: it includes one or more masters and a collection of slaves, while the slaves run on a variety of operating systems, the masters coordinate the slaves’ activities, monitor source-code repositories for any changes, and gives reports to users and developers.
Buildbot is the continuous integration framework and a powerful tool that provides the structure and components to automate your build, test, and release processes. To know more or try it out visit buildbot.net.