Jenkins X CLI (jx)

To install the JX CLI on Linux, download the appropriate tarball for your architecture using curl, extract it, and move the binary to /usr/local/bin.

Note: Replace {{.Version}} in the commands below with the specific version you wish to install (e.g., v3.17.80).

# For amd64
curl -L https://github.com/jenkins-x/jx/releases/download/v{{.Version}}/jx-linux-amd64.tar.gz | tar xzv
sudo mv jx /usr/local/bin

# For arm
curl -L https://github.com/jenkins-x/jx/releases/download/v{{.Version}}/jx-linux-arm.tar.gz | tar xzv
sudo mv jx /usr/local/bin

# For arm64
curl -L https://github.com/jenkins-x/jx/releases/download/v{{.Version}}/jx-linux-arm64.tar.gz | tar xzv
sudo mv jx /usr/local/bin

Use the jx dashboard command to view the JayeX Pipelines Dashboard. By default, this command attempts to open the dashboard URL in your default web browser. You can also use the alias jx dash.

# open the dashboard
jx dashboard

# or using the alias
jx dash

Use the jx create quickstart command (or its aliases) to initiate the Jenkins X quickstart process. This command is a shortcut for jx project quickstart and is designed to guide you through the initial setup and creation of a Jenkins X project environment.

jx create quickstart
# or using aliases
jx qs

You can install the JX CLI on macOS using Homebrew or by downloading the binary directly via curl.

Note: Replace {{.Version}} in the curl commands with the specific version you wish to install.

# Using Homebrew
brew install --no-quarantine --cask jenkins-x/jx/jx

# Using curl (amd64)
curl -L https://github.com/jenkins-x/jx/releases/download/v{{.Version}}/jx-darwin-amd64.tar.gz | tar xzv
sudo mv jx /usr/local/bin

# Using curl (arm64)
curl -L https://github.com/jenkins-x/jx/releases/download/v{{.Version}}/jx-darwin-arm64.tar.gz | tar xzv
sudo mv jx /usr/local/bin

The jx command is the primary entry point for the JayeX 3.x command line interface. It is used to manage Jenkins X environments, pipelines, and components through a variety of subcommands.

To view the available commands and general help, use the --help flag.

jx --help

The jx CLI uses an extension mechanism to support commands not present in the core binary.

1. Discovery: When you run a command like jx foo-bar, the CLI first checks if foo-bar is a built-in command.
2. Plugin Mapping: If not found, it searches for a plugin binary named jx-foo-bar in your default plugin directory (typically ~/.jakes/bin or similar, managed by homedir.DefaultPluginDir).
3. Automatic Installation: If a plugin is identified via the internal PluginMap but not found locally, jx will attempt to install the correct version automatically using extensions.EnsurePluginInstalled.
4. Execution: Once found or installed, the CLI executes the plugin, passing along the remaining arguments and setting environment variables (BINARY_NAME and TOP_LEVEL_COMMAND) so the plugin knows how it was invoked.

The documentation generator expects Markdown files to be organized in a directory structure mirroring the CLI command hierarchy under docs/reference/cmd/.

Each command's documentation is stored in a file named {command_name}.md (or {parent}_{child}.md for subcommands). To correctly populate the CLI's Long description and Example fields, the Markdown files must use specific headers:

• ## Description: Everything following this header is used as the command's long description.
• ## Examples: Everything following this header is used as the command's usage examples.

If a file does not exist for a specific command, the generator logs a warning and skips that command.