[FIXED] Managing Plugin Versions in Jenkins Job's config.xml

Issue

I have a jenkins system that is under salt configuration management. Plugins and their versions are managed through salt.

Jobs however are just the config.xml that are stored as-is.

My question is : How significant is the version number mentioned for each plugin in the Job's config.xml?

Eg: The following is a snippet from one of the job's config.xml file.

<buildWrappers>
    <hudson.plugins.ansicolor.AnsiColorBuildWrapper plugin="[email protected]">
      <colorMapName>xterm</colorMapName>
    </hudson.plugins.ansicolor.AnsiColorBuildWrapper>
</buildWrappers>

In this example it says the ansicolor plugin is version 0.4.2.

What if I actually update the plugin on Jenkins to, lets say, version 0.7.2 and I DONT update the job's config.xml?

Q: Does it matter that the versions are out-of-sync?

Q: What If I remove the version from the config.xml altogether? Like below:

<buildWrappers>
    <hudson.plugins.ansicolor.AnsiColorBuildWrapper plugin="ansicolor">
      <colorMapName>xterm</colorMapName>
    </hudson.plugins.ansicolor.AnsiColorBuildWrapper>
</buildWrappers>

What is the effects of doing the above?

Solution

You don't need to update jobs' config files manually. Job will do it for you ONLY on the next run.

Answered By - Dmitriy Tarasevich
Answer Checked By - Senaida (JavaFixing Volunteer)