Installing Buildkite Agent on Debian
The Buildkite Agent can be installed on Debian versions 7.x and above using our signed apt repository.
On this page:
Installation
Firstly, ensure your list of packages is up to date:
sudo apt-get update
Debian doesn't always have sudo available, so you can run these commands as root and omit the sudo, or install the sudo package as root first.
Next, ensure you have the apt-transport-https package installed for the https package repository, and the dirmngr package installed for adding the signing key:
sudo apt-get install -y apt-transport-https dirmngr
Now you can add our signed apt repository:
sudo apt-key adv --keyserver ipv4.pool.sks-keyservers.net --recv-keys 32A37959C2FA5C3C99EFBC32A79206696452D198
echo "deb https://apt.buildkite.com/buildkite-agent stable main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/buildkite-agent.list
Then install the agent:
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install -y buildkite-agent
Then configure your agent token:
sudo sed -i "s/xxx/INSERT-YOUR-AGENT-TOKEN-HERE/g" /etc/buildkite-agent/buildkite-agent.cfg
And then start the agent:
# For Debian 8.x and above (systemd)
sudo systemctl enable buildkite-agent && sudo systemctl start buildkite-agent
# For Debian 7.x (using upstart)
sudo service buildkite-agent start
# For Debian 7.x (using sysvinit)
sudo /etc/init.d/buildkite-agent start
You can view the logs at:
# For Debian 8.x and above (systemd)
sudo journalctl -f -u buildkite-agent
# For Debian 7.x (using upstart)
sudo tail -f /var/log/upstart/buildkite-agent.log
# For Debian 7.x (using sysvinit)
sudo tail -f /var/log/buildkite-agent.log
SSH Key Configuration
SSH keys should be copied to (or generated into) /var/lib/buildkite-agent/.ssh/. For example, to generate a new private key which you can add to your source code host:
$ sudo su buildkite-agent
$ mkdir -p ~/.ssh && cd ~/.ssh
$ ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 4096 -C "build@myorg.com"
See the Agent SSH Keys documentation for more details.
File Locations
- Configuration:
/etc/buildkite-agent/buildkite-agent.cfg - Hooks:
/etc/buildkite-agent/hooks/ - Builds:
/var/lib/buildkite-agent/builds/ - Logs, depending on your system:
journalctl -f -u buildkite-agent(systemd)/var/log/upstart/buildkite-agent.log(upstart)/var/log/buildkite-agent.log(older systems)
- Agent user home:
/var/lib/buildkite-agent/ - SSH keys:
/var/lib/buildkite-agent/.ssh/
Configuration
The configuration file is located at /etc/buildkite-agent/buildkite-agent.cfg. See the configuration documentation for an explanation of each configuration setting.
Running multiple agents
You can run as many parallel agents on the one machine as you wish by duplicating the systemd/upstart service configuration file, for example:
For Debian 8.x and above (systemd)
# Disable the default unit
sudo systemctl stop buildkite-agent && sudo systemctl disable buildkite-agent
# Create a systemd template
sudo cp /lib/systemd/system/buildkite-agent.service /etc/systemd/system/buildkite-agent@.service
# Now, as many times as you like
sudo systemctl enable buildkite-agent@1 && sudo systemctl start buildkite-agent@1
sudo systemctl enable buildkite-agent@2 && sudo systemctl start buildkite-agent@2
# Follow them all
sudo journalctl -f -u "buildkite-agent@*"
# Or one-by-one
sudo journalctl -f -u buildkite-agent@2
For Debian 7.x (using upstart)
sudo cp /etc/init/buildkite-agent.conf /etc/init/buildkite-agent-2.conf
sudo service buildkite-agent-2 start
sudo tail -f /var/log/upstart/buildkite-agent-2.log
Upgrading
The Buildkite Agent can be upgraded like any other system package:
sudo apt-get update && apt-get upgrade