This chapter reviews the relationship between Jenkins, Ant, Gradle, and Maven builds, and there is also a small amount of scripting with Groovy and Ant.
Jenkins is the master of flexibility. It works well across multiple platforms and technologies. Jenkins has an intuitive interface with clear configuration settings. This is great for getting the job done. However, it is also important that you clearly define the boundaries between Jenkins plugins and Maven build files. A lack of separation will make you unnecessarily dependent on Jenkins. If you know that you will always run your builds through Jenkins, then you can afford to place some of the core work in Jenkins plugins, gaining interesting extra functionality.
Jenkins is technology agnostic and can glue together project technologies across the organization, development teams, and software position in their life...