Using vRA ABX actions to execute and monitor Jenkins jobs

I hit the requirement recently to execute a Jenkins job as part of a VM build within vRA. I wanted to execute the job and monitor it for completion. Once the Jenkins job was complete, I knew the VM was ready for usage so needed the action to wait for success.

To do this I used an ABX action within vRA Cloud, using an extensibility proxy to provide connectivity to a local Jenkins instance.

Step 1 – Configure a Jenkins job with parameter input

Create a Jenkins job which includes parameters. For me, this allowed each Jenkins run to be tailored to a particular VM that vRA was provisioning by allowing inputs such as the VM name, IP, OStype, Disk data etc.

Example parameter configuration in Jenkins

Step 2 – Create an ABX Action in Cloud Assembly

Few Notes:

jenkins_user is a base 64 string of jenkinsusername:apikey
All input variables are coming from the event broker [inputs] pipeline, which also include any custom properties inherrited from projects and/or blueprints.
I am utilising some additional modules in this code as can be seen from the ‘import xxx’. In terms of dependancies on the ABX action, only requests needs to be listed
If the Jenkins job completes successfully, I return an outputs array back to the VM with the URL of the completed Jenkins job, so if there is ever a problem with the build it can be traced.
*Disclaimer* – I’m pretty naff at coding so it probably could be written in a much neater way than this!!

import base64
import requests
import time
import json
def handler(context, inputs):
  
  #Variable definition
  
    for i in inputs['addresses']:
        vmIp = i[0]
    print(vmIp)
    vmName = inputs['resourceNames'][0]
    print(vmName)
    #env = inputs['customProperties']['sdlc']
    env = 'prod'
    print(env)
    osType = inputs['customProperties']['osType'][0:1].upper() + 
inputs['customProperties']['osType'][1:].lower()
    print(osType)
    disks = inputs['customProperties']['diskgrid']
    print(disks)
    print(customer)
    version = 'v1'
    role = 'Admin'
    ANSIBLE_ssm_auto_patch = inputs['customProperties']['ssm_auto_patch'].lower()
    print(ANSIBLE_ssm_auto_patch)
    jenkins_url = "https://jenkins.local"
    jenkins_crumb_url = 'https://jenkins.local/crumbIssuer/api/xml?xpath=concat(//crumbRequestField,":",//crumb)'
    jenkins_job_path = "/job/jenkins_job_name"
    jenkins_user = "base64placeholder"
    jenkins_build_params = "/buildWithParameters?VMNAME=" + vmName + "&IPADDR=" + vmIp + "&ENVIRONMENT=" + env + "&VERSION=" + version + "&role=" + role + "&OSTYPE=" + osType 
    jenkins_last_build = "/lastBuild/api/json"
    jenkins_build_path = jenkins_url + jenkins_job_path + jenkins_build_params
    jenkins_lastbuild_uri = jenkins_url + jenkins_job_path + jenkins_last_build
    
    #Create requests header
    session = requests.Session()
    session.trust_env = False
    session.headers.update({"Authorization" : "Basic " + jenkins_user})
    session.headers.update({"Content-Type" : "application/json"})
    
    #Get Crumb
    response = session.post(jenkins_crumb_url, verify = False, proxies = None)
    print('Request response code is: ' + str(response.status_code))
    crumb = response.text.split(":")[1]
    print('Crumb: ' + crumb)
    
    #Update header with crumb
    session.headers.update({"Jenkins-Crumb" : crumb})
    #Execute POST request using variables
    response = session.post(jenkins_build_path, verify = False, proxies = None)
    print('Request response code is: ' + str(response.status_code))
    if response.status_code == 201:
        location = str(response.headers['location'])
        print('Job Queue Found: ' + location)
        jenkins_start_path = location + '/api/json'
        response = session.post(jenkins_start_path, verify = False, proxies = None)
        i = 0
        while i < 20:
             response = session.post(jenkins_start_path, verify = False, proxies = None)
             if response.status_code == 200:
                 print(response.text)
                 if b"executable" in response.content:
                     json_content = json.loads(response.content)
                     job_url = json_content['executable']['url']
                     print("Job Identified: " + job_url)
                     break
                 else:
                     time.sleep(3)
                     i = i + 1
                     print("Loop ID: ")
                     print(i)
    
    #Check job is successful
    current_build_path = job_url + '/api/json'
    i = 0
    while i < 60:
        response = session.post(current_build_path, verify = False, proxies = None)
        json_response = json.loads(response.content)
        print(json_response['result'])
        if response.status_code == 200:
                if json_response['result'] == "SUCCESS":
                    print("JOB COMPLETED " + job_url)
                    break
                elif json_response['result'] == "FAILURE":
                    raise NameError("JOB FAILED " + job_url)
                    break
                elif json_response['result'] == "ABORTED":
                    raise NameError("JOB ABORTED " + job_url)
                    break
                else:
                    i = i+1
                    time.sleep(10)
                    
    outputs = {}
    outputs['customProperties'] = inputs['customProperties']
    outputs['customProperties']['jenkins_build'] = job_url
    return outputs

The code loops every 10 seconds waiting for Jenkins to return ‘JOB COMPLETED’, before closing down.

If you make sure your vRA subscription is set to ‘Blocking’, then the VM will not show as available until the action completes.

Custom jenkins_build property against the VM

This job works incredibly well and could also be written in vRO, which would probably be preferable as you could hold all your credentials in a constants file as secure strings…this is functionality still missing for ABX within vRA Cloud.

References:

https://blogs.vmware.com/management/2020/03/vra-abx-powershell.html

https://docs.vmware.com/en/vRealize-Automation/8.1/Using-and-Managing-Cloud-Assembly/GUID-AB39FD64-7545-474E-9064-8553FADD0ECF.html