Gradle-Docker-Plugin and Docker-Client available

In line with our deployment pipeline written in Gradle and using Docker, we currently use Groovy’s process execution methods to talk with a command line Docker client.

That way we make ourselves dependent to an installed Docker client on our CI servers. Since we don’t like to provide a bunch of specific CI servers, I started to implement a HTTP client for Docker, written in Groovy. The reason not to use existing Java implementations of such a Docker client was simply timing: some months ago the now completely rewritten Java Docker API Client wasn’t so well maintained than today… and, well, I like to play with new tools and wanted to explore the Docker remote API for myself.

Using a Java API would be one possible solution to rewrite our Gradle scripts, but in order to implement a higher level interface on top of the HTTP wrapper I wanted to use Gradle plugin mechanisms and a simple task configuration.

So here they are: the inevitable duo of a Docker-Client written in Groovy and a Gradle-Docker-Plugin - along with a small Gradle example project.

Please have a look at the projects, give them a try and if you find any missing feature or bug, please create an issue at one of the projects linked above! I would also be glad about feedback, either via Twitter @gesellix or by mail (tobias @ gesellix.de). Thank you!