You can use the promotion feature to promote code to a target environment by build number, for example, promote build number 42 to production. Here are some of the benefits of using promotions:

Create repeatable deployments
Create an audit trail
Reduce human error
Segregation of duties
Revoke developer access to server environments

How it Works

When you promote a build, Drone creates a new build (with a new build number) that inherits its values from the build being promoted. This new build will have an event type is set to promote. You can reference the event type and target environment in your pipeline configuration.

When Drone executes your build, by default, it executes all pipelines and all steps defined in your yaml. You can limit pipeline and step execution by event and by target environment.

Limit pipeline execution by target environment:

 1
 2
 3
 4
 5
 6
 7
 8
 9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21


kind: pipeline
type: docker
name: default

steps:
- name: test
  image: node
  commands:
  - npm install
  - npm run test
  - npm run bundle

- name: deploy
  image: plugins/ssh
  settings: ...

trigger:
  event:
  - promote
  target:
  - production

Limit pipeline step execution by target environment:

 1
 2
 3
 4
 5
 6
 7
 8
 9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20


kind: pipeline
type: docker
name: deploy

steps:
- name: test
  image: node
  commands:
  - npm install
  - npm run test
  - npm run bundle

- name: deploy
  image: plugins/ssh
  settings: ...
  when:
    event:
    - promote
    target:
    - production

Create separate pipelines for promotions:

 1
 2
 3
 4
 5
 6
 7
 8
 9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38


kind: pipeline
type: docker
name: build

steps:
- name: test
  image: node
  commands:
  - npm install
  - npm run test

trigger:
  event:
  - push
  - pull_request

---
kind: pipeline
type: docker
name: deploy

steps:
- name: test
  image: node
  commands:
  - npm install
  - npm run test
  - npm run bundle

- name: deploy
  image: plugins/ssh
  settings: ...

trigger:
  event:
  - promote
  target:
  - production

How To Promote

You can promote builds using the command line utility:

Use the build promote command:

$ drone build promote <repo> <number> <environment>

Example promotes build number 42 to staging:

$ drone build promote octocat/hello-world 42 staging

Example promotes build number 42 to production:

$ drone build promote octocat/hello-world 42 production

In the above examples we reference staging and production environments, however, the environment is a freeform field. You can use any environment name.