Blue Ocean vs Jenkins: What are the differences?

Introduction

Blue Ocean and Jenkins are both continuous integration and delivery (CI/CD) platforms used for automating the software development process. However, there are key differences between the two that set them apart. In this article, we will explore the differences between Blue Ocean and Jenkins in detail.

1. User Interface: Blue Ocean provides a modern and intuitive user interface compared to Jenkins. It offers a sleek and visually appealing dashboard that allows developers to have a better visualization of their pipeline. The UI in Blue Ocean simplifies the process of creating, organizing, and visualizing complex pipelines, making it more user-friendly for both technical and non-technical users.

2. Pipeline Visualization: Blue Ocean offers a powerful and dynamic visualization of pipelines, providing a clear overview of the software delivery process. It allows developers to easily identify the status of each stage, branch, and job within the pipeline. On the other hand, Jenkins has a less visually appealing pipeline visualization, which can make it harder for developers to grasp the overall pipeline structure and status.

3. Pipeline Editor: Blue Ocean provides a visual pipeline editor, making it easier for developers to create and modify pipelines. The editor allows users to drag and drop stages, add or remove steps, and set up the overall pipeline flow without having to write code. This feature provides a more intuitive and user-friendly approach compared to Jenkins, where pipelines are typically defined using declarative syntax in a Jenkinsfile.

4. Extensibility: While Jenkins has an extensive range of plugins available, Blue Ocean is tightly integrated with Jenkins, utilizing its rich plugin ecosystem. Blue Ocean inherits the extensibility of Jenkins, allowing users to leverage the vast number of available plugins for additional functionality. However, Blue Ocean also offers specific plugins and integrations designed to enhance the user experience and improve the usability of its UI.

5. Supported Technologies: Blue Ocean supports a wide range of modern technologies and cloud platforms out of the box, enabling developers to easily integrate with tools and services commonly used in today's software development landscape. Jenkins, being a more established platform, also supports a wide range of technologies but may require plugin installations or additional configurations to achieve the same level of integration with some modern technologies.

6. Pipeline Metrics and Analytics: Blue Ocean provides comprehensive pipeline metrics and analytics right out of the box, giving developers insights into the efficiency and performance of their software delivery process. It offers built-in visualizations and historical data on execution times, success rates, and more. Jenkins, while it can also provide metrics and analytics through plugins, may require additional setup and configurations to achieve similar pipeline monitoring capabilities as Blue Ocean.

In summary, Blue Ocean offers a modern and user-friendly interface, powerful pipeline visualization, visual pipeline editor, tight integration with Jenkins plugins, support for modern technologies, and comprehensive pipeline metrics and analytics. These key differences set Blue Ocean apart from Jenkins, providing developers with an enhanced user experience and improved functionalities for continuous integration and delivery.