<p>I think the major deciding factor is the expertise of you and the rest of your company in the chosen OS. If you are a Windows shop, and your company is willing to leverage the cost of the node, it's probably best choice to host it on a Windows VM. For choosing a Linux distro, I would see what is most common across your company. In my opinion, it is not worth the benefit of creating a vm with a one off distro just because of a few particular features, unless those features of the distro are absolutely necessary. </p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-09-22T04:23:04.997Z
Or to put it more concisely: stick with what you know.
jayhendren
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-09-22T09:34:17.867Z
While I agree with the overall idea, some tools have more 'affinity' with one distro than another and using this one could be useful and avoid problems. But it's a matter of checking if there's bugs specific to a distro.
Tensibai
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-09-22T13:47:07.600Z
@Tensibai I totally agree with that. I also believe it's a tradeoff though. Would you rather have an OS that has an affinity towards a tool that makes it slightly easier to configure, or would you rather have the overhead of managing the config, patching, etc. of a distro for a single node? I think it's a both a preference and a matter of choice that needs to be evaluated on a case by case basis.
Preston Martin
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-09-22T13:57:02.857Z
@PrestonM I agree but, for example, running a jenkins master on a windows host makes some plugin to fail and sometimes raise some unexpected errors. So it *may* worth having one linux host for this. you're totally right it's a case by case basis.
Tensibai
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-09-22T14:20:27.373Z
@Tensibai Right. That would definitely be a good case for considering a different OS.
Preston Martin
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-09-21T15:11:20.957Z
2017-09-21T15:11:20.957Z
Preston Martin
<p>Say you are developing a new CI/CD system, deploy builds across Linux, Windows and Mac, and have now reached the point of wanting to deploy a master node which hosts your chosen CI tool. How do you choose what OS and version your master node VM should be?</p>

<p>For example with <a href="https://about.gitlab.com/installation/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Gitlab</a>, I can have the VM with Ubuntu, Debian or CentOS, or with <a href="https://jenkins.io/download/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Jenkins</a>, the VM could be Mac, Windows, Ubuntu, Debian etc...</p>

<p>What's the major deciding factor when choosing an OS and version for the master node of the CI system?</p>

<jenkins><continuous-integration><continuous-delivery><gitlab>
What OS should a master node CI virtual machine be?
Rekovni
# What OS should a master node CI virtual machine be?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2017-09-21)

Say you are developing a new CI/CD system, deploy builds across Linux, Windows and Mac, and have now reached the point of wanting to deploy a master node which hosts your chosen CI tool. How do you choose what OS and version your master node VM should be?

For example with [Gitlab](https://about.gitlab.com/installation/), I can have the VM with Ubuntu, Debian or CentOS, or with [Jenkins](https://jenkins.io/download/), the VM could be Mac, Windows, Ubuntu, Debian etc...

What's the major deciding factor when choosing an OS and version for the master node of the CI system?

**Tags:** jenkins, continuous-integration, continuous-delivery, gitlab


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2017-09-21. Score: 5 | Accepted answer

I think the major deciding factor is the expertise of you and the rest of your company in the chosen OS. If you are a Windows shop, and your company is willing to leverage the cost of the node, it's probably best choice to host it on a Windows VM. For choosing a Linux distro, I would see what is most common across your company. In my opinion, it is not worth the benefit of creating a vm with a one off distro just because of a few particular features, unless those features of the distro are absolutely necessary.

> **Comments:**
> **username_2**: Or to put it more concisely: stick with what you know.  
> **username_3**: While I agree with the overall idea, some tools have more 'affinity' with one distro than another and using this one could be useful and avoid problems. But it's a matter of checking if there's bugs specific to a distro.  
> **username_1**: @username_3 I totally agree with that. I also believe it's a tradeoff though. Would you rather have an OS that has an affinity towards a tool that makes it slightly easier to configure, or would you rather have the overhead of managing the config, patching, etc. of a distro for a single node? I think it's a both a preference and a matter of choice that needs to be evaluated on a case by case basis.  
> **username_3**: @PrestonM I agree but, for example, running a jenkins master on a windows host makes some plugin to fail and sometimes raise some unexpected errors. So it *may* worth having one linux host for this. you're totally right it's a case by case basis.  
> **username_1**: @username_3 Right. That would definitely be a good case for considering a different OS.  

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