In the realm of mobile app development, mobile CI/CD pipelines are essential for ensuring the quality, reliability, and efficiency of your app release cycles. By automating the build, test, and deployment processes, CI/CD pipelines streamline development and help teams deliver coding updates faster and more reliably.
In this blog, we will cover some valuable tips for building your mobile CI/CD pipeline to maximize your application development process and delivery high-quality mobile apps for your end users.
Related Reading: The Future Is Now: Mobile & Web Application Testing With AI
What is a Mobile CI/CD Pipeline?
A mobile CI/CD pipeline is a process used in software development to test and create mobile applications. CI/CD is shorthand for “continuous integration and continuous delivery”. The mobile CI/CD pipeline works to continuously integrate new code changes, helps test the application across devices, and facilitates app deployment.
Mobile CI/CD Pipeline Overview
As stated above, a mobile CI/CD pipeline is a series of automated processes that help ensure the quality and stability of mobile apps. A mobile CI/CD pipeline can be broken down into two distinct phases:
Continuous Integration (CI)
In the period of continuous integration, code changes can be merged into the main code base. Automated tests are run during this phase to check for any errors or bugs in the application. If any issues arise, they can be addressed promptly.
Continuous Delivery (CD)
Continuous delivery is when the code has passed the integration phase and can be utilized for building the mobile app. This is the phase when automated tools are used to prepare the app for deployment.
Related Reading: How to Automate Your CI/CD in Testing
Benefits of CI/CD Pipelines for Mobile Apps
There are numerous advantages to utilizing a CI/CD pipeline for mobile applications, including:
Faster Delivery
The mobile CI/CD pipeline helps teams automate the app development, testing, and deployment processes, leading to faster delivery of your mobile application. With a robust mobile CI/CD pipeline, you can take care of all the tedious and repetitive tasks that usually set the process back.
Consistent Quality
Incorporating a mobile CI/CD pipeline helps maintain consistent quality across all versions of your application. In addition, frequent testing of code earlier in the development cycle reduces the risk of bugs escaping into production.
Early Bug Detection
Issues are identified early in the development cycle, which reduces the chances of bugs escaping into production. Catching bugs and glitches early on also saves your team time and money.
Increased Collaboration
When your team utilizes a mobile CI/CD pipeline, various team members can more effectively work together, especially when tedious manual processes are automated. This frees up time to focus on more innovative approaches to app development.
Related Reading: The Keys to a Strong CI/CD Pipeline
Tips for Building a Mobile CI/CD Pipeline
Now that we have covered the benefits of a mobile CI/CD pipeline, let us take a closer look at how to set one up for your team.
Here are the steps to building a mobile CI/CD pipeline:
Select Your CI/CD Tools
Select your preferred tools, such as Jenkins, for automation.
Automate Your Builds
Once you’ve selected your preferred tools, the next step is to configure these tools to automate whenever code changes occur.
Automate Your Testing
Set up your tools to automate tests, including unit testing, integration testing, and UI testing.
Check Code Quality
Be sure to implement a code review process in order to maintain consistent quality.
Configure Environments
Next, configure your development, testing, and production environments.
Monitoring & Feedback
Set up tools to monitor your testing pipeline, track performance, and analyze results.
By following these tips, you can establish a robust mobile CI/CD pipeline that accelerates your development cycles, enhances code quality, and ensures a seamless release process for your mobile applications.
Bottom Line
When it comes to choosing the right testing tools, Perfecto is the ideal solution. Building a robust mobile CI/CD pipeline with Perfecto is a seamless experience and allows testing teams to keep pace with the competition and deliver high-quality mobile apps, consistently.
When you test your apps with Perfecto, you will experience:
- Unified testing
- Advanced automation.
- Full toolchain integration.
- All results in one place.
- Accelerated testing.
- Shift Left Testing.
Experience complete continuous testing for yourself by signing up for a free 14-day trial of Perfecto today.