Buildkite Packages

Buildkite Packages is a product that:

  • Manages artifacts and packages from Buildkite Pipelines, as well as other CI/CD applications that require artifact management.

  • Provides registries to store your packages and other package-like file formats such as container images and Terraform modules.

As well as storing a collection of packages, a registry also surfaces metadata or attributes associated with a package, such as the package's description, version, contents (files and directories), checksum details, distribution type, dependencies, and so on.

Buildkite Packages is currently in private beta

Please visit the Buildkite Packages page on our website to join the waitlist for this product and register for early access.

An introduction to packages

A package is a combination of metadata, configuration, and software that is prepared in a way that a package management tool can use to properly and reliably install software and related configuration data on a computer. Some examples of package management tools include:

  • apt on Ubuntu
  • yum on RedHat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
  • pip for Python packages
  • gem for RubyGems

Packages are useful because their:

  • Version information helps keep software up to date
  • Metadata offers visibility in what's installed to which locations and why
  • Software installations are reproducible in different environments.

Package creation tools

There are many tools for creating packages. Some of these tools are provided directly by Linux distributions, while many other third-party packaging tools are also available.

Some popular package creation tools include:

Some advanced package creation tools include:

  • Mock, a chroot-based system for building RPM packages in a clean room environment
  • pbuilder, a chroot-based system for building deb packages in a clean room environment. Useful tips about pbuilder can also be found in pbuilder's user manual
  • git-buildpackage, a set of scripts that can be used to build deb packages directly from git repositories
  • fpm, a third-party tool that allows users to quickly and easily make a variety of packages (including RPM and deb packages)
  • PackPack, a simple tool to build RPM and Debian packages from git repositories.

Supported package ecosystems

Currently, Buildkite Packages supports the following package ecosystems:

  • Alpine
  • Docker container images
  • Debian (deb for Debian and Ubuntu)
  • Ruby (RubyGems gem)
  • Java (Maven and Gradle)
  • JavaScript (Node.js npm)
  • Python (PyPI)
  • RPM (Fedora and RHEL)
  • Terraform modules

Getting started tutorial

Learn more about how: