Knapsack Pro

Google Cloud Build vs GoCD comparison of Continuous Integration servers
What are the differences between Google Cloud Build and GoCD?

Google Cloud Build

https://cloud.google.com/cloud-build/

GoCD

https://www.gocd.org
Unique feature

Security / speed

Free, open source CI/CD server

Type of product

SaaS

On Premise

Offers a free plan

Yes

Google offers a generous 120 build-minutes per day plan, not including time spent waiting in the queue.

Yes

Free, open source software. They provide some Enterprise add-ons and support at a cost though.

Predictable pricing

Yes (partial)

While it's clear what the cost is (priced per build-minute), figuring out costs can be a hassle, especially as the price can vary quite a bit depending on commits to the project.

Yes

For the Enterprise plans, they specify very clear tiers depending on the number of pipelines (directly correlated with the size of the organization)

Support / SLA

Yes

Even available as a paid add-on, for 24/7 phone support for example: https://cloud.google.com/support/

Yes

Paid support available for enterprise plans

Paralellism
Every CI servers tends to address this differently (parallel, distributed, build matrix). Some of it is just marketing, and some is just nuance. For this table, parallel means that tasks can be run concurrently on the same machine, distributed means that tasks can be scaled horizontally, on multiple machines
How to split tests in parallel in the optimal way with Knapsack Pro

Yes

Yes

Distributed builds
distributed means that tasks can be scaled horizontally, on multiple machines
How to split tests in parallel in the optimal way with Knapsack Pro

N/A

Yes

They specify supporting tools like TLB (http://test-load-balancer.github.io/) which would require distributed builds.

Containers support / Build environment

Yes

Native Docker and Packer support

Yes

Native Docker and Kubernetes support

Analytics / Status overview
Analytics and overview referrs to the ability to, at a glance, see what's breaking (be it a certain task, or the build for a specific project)

Yes

Yes

One of the greatest things about GoCD is their Value Stream Map which allows tracing every pipeline through every stage, from code commit, to testing and deployment. They also offer various dashboards for seeing status at a glance.

Management support
How easy is it to manage users / projects / assign roles and permissions and so on

Yes

Yes

Allows managing users, assigning roles, and even defining user groups with specific rights for certain pipelines.

Self-hosted option

No (partial)

While there's no self hosted variant, they provide a local Cloud Build image which allows you to build locally, very valuable for debugging.

Yes

Hosted plans / SaaS

Yes

No

Build pipelines
A continuous delivery pipeline is a description of the process that the software goes through from a new code commit, through testing and other statical analysis steps all the way to the end-users of the product.

Yes

Configurable via YML and/or JSON files.

Yes

Fairly advanced support, from config files (YML, Groovy, JSON, etc) to API and UI interface for building and managing pipelines.

Reports
Reports are about the abilty to see specific reports (like code coverage or custom ones), but not necesarily tied in into a larger dashboard.

Yes

Yes

Ecosystem
Besides the official documentation and software, is there a large community using this product? Are there any community-driven tools / plugins that you can use?

Yes

There are predefined images built for Cloud Build, which can be integrated right away in your build process. Some of them are first party: https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/cloud-builders and others are community contributed: https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/cloud-builders-community

Yes

Wide array of plugins available: https://www.gocd.org/plugins/#artifact (although they seem to pride themselves on the fact that most common operations / needs are first class citizens, so no plugins needed)

Specific language support: Ruby
Some CI servers have built-in support for parsing RSpec or Istanbul output for example and we mention those. Some others make it even easier by detecting Gemfiles or package.json and automate parts of the process for the developer.

N/A

Nothing specific as far as we can tell

Yes

Available via plugins, such as the Gem repository poller: https://www.gocd.org/plugins/#package-repo

Specific language support: JavaScript

Yes (partial)

npm, yarn and jasmine-node support via predefined Cloud Build steps.

Yes

Available via plugins, such as the npm repository poller: https://www.gocd.org/plugins/#package-repo

Integrations
1st party support for common tools (like Slack notifications, various VCS platforms, etc)

Yes

Various integrations available via custom Build Steps, as well as natively (Kubernetes, Docker, etc.)

Yes

Integrations are also available via plugins (for notifications, LDAP authorization, Elastic agents and more): https://www.gocd.org/plugins/#notification

API
Custom integreation is available, via an API or otherwise, it's mentioned separately as it allows further customization than any of the Ecosystem/Integration options

Yes

REST API and comprehensive CLI tool, as well as a pub/sub system for build notifications.

Yes

You can build on top of GoCD in a variety of ways, from writing custom plugins to using the CCTray feed provided by it.

Auditing

Yes

Yes

Additional notes

Not unlike other Google tools, there's a strong emphasis on allowing developers to build on top of the service. Becomes more valuable if you're using other Google Cloud services as well.

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