nx-cloud CLI
npx nx-cloud start-ci-run
At the beginning of your main job, invoke npx nx-cloud start-ci-run. This tells Nx Cloud that the following series of command correspond to the same CI run.
nx-cloud start-ci-run is designed to run in CI. If you run the command locally, it can cause your local Nx repo to think it's a part of a CI run. This can cause strange behavior like Nx commands timing out or throwing unexpected errors.
If you accidentally run the command locally, you can remove your system's temp files to reset your local system. Typically restarting your system is enough to fix this issue.
You can configure your CI run by passing the following flags:
--distribute-on
Tells Nx Cloud how many agents to use (and what launch templates to use) to distribute tasks. E.g., npx nx-cloud start-ci-run --distribute-on="8 linux-medium-js" will distribute CI using 8 agents that are initialized using the linux-medium-js launch template.
You can use different types of launch templates as follows: npx nx-cloud start-ci-run --distribute-on="5 linux-medium-js, 3 linux-large-js".
You can also define the configuration in a file and reference it as follows: npx nx-cloud start-ci-run --distribute-on=".nx/workflows/dynamic-changesets.yaml".
1distribute-on:
2 small-changeset: 3 linux-medium-js
3 medium-changeset: 6 linux-medium-js
4 large-changeset: 10 linux-medium-js
5--with-env-vars
By default, invoking npx nx-cloud start-ci-run will take all environment variables prefixed with NX_ and send them over to agents. This means that your access token, verbose logging configuration and other Nx-related environment variables will be the same on your main CI jobs and the agents.
If you want to pass other environment variables from the main job to agents, you can do it as follows: --with-env-vars="VAR1,VAR2". This will set VAR1 and VAR2 on agents to the same values set on the main job before any steps run.
You can also pass --with-env-vars="auto" which will filter out all OS-specific environment variables and pass the rest to agents.
Using --with-env-vars="auto" will override any existing environment variables on the agent, some of which might be critical to the functionality of that machine. In case of unexpected issues on agents, try fallback to the explicit variable definition using --with-env-vars="VAR1,VAR2,...".
Note: none of the values passed to agents are stored by Nx Cloud.
--use-dte-by-default
By default, invoking npx nx-cloud start-ci-run will configure Nx to distribute all commands by default. You can disable this as follows: npx nx-cloud start-ci-run --use-dte-by-default=false.
--stop-agents-on-failure
By default, a failure in one of the commands is going to terminate the whole CI run and will stop all the agents. You can disable this as follows: npx nx-cloud start-ci-run --stop-agents-on-failure=false.
--stop-agents-after
By default, Nx Cloud won't terminate any agents until you invoke npx nx-cloud stop-all-agents because Nx Cloud doesn't know if you will need agents to run another command. This can result in agents being idle at the end of a CI run.
You can fix it by telling Nx Cloud that it can terminate agents after it sees a certain target: npx nx-cloud start-ci-run --stop-agents-after=e2e.
The target name for --stop-agents-after should be the last target run within your pipeline. If not, Nx Cloud will end the CI pipeline execution, preventing the subsequent commands from running.
Incorrect example:
1- run: npx nx-cloud start-ci-run --stop-agents-after=build
2- run: nx affected -t build
3- run: nx affected -t lint
4- run: nx affected -t test
5If build tasks are all cached, then all build tasks will complete immediately causing lint and test tasks to fail with an error saying the CI pipeline execution has already been completed. Instead you should re-order your targets to make sure the build target is last.
Corrected example:
1- run: npx nx-cloud start-ci-run --stop-agents-after=build
2- run: nx affected -t lint
3- run: nx affected -t test
4- run: nx affected -t build
5--require-explicit-completion
By default, Nx Cloud will monitor the main CI job and once it completes it will complete the associated CIPE object on the Nx Cloud side. You can disable this by passing --require-explicit-completion. In this case, you will have to add npx nx-cloud complete-ci-run.
Enabling/Disabling Distribution
Invoking npx nx-cloud start-ci-run will tell Nx to distribute by default. You can enable/disable distribution for individual commands as follows:
nx affected -t build --agents(explicitly enable distribution)nx affected -t build --no-agents(explicitly disable distribution)
npx nx-cloud stop-all-agents
Same as npx nx-cloud complete-ci-run.
This command tells Nx Cloud to terminate all agents associated with this CI pipeline execution. Invoking this command is not needed anymore. New versions of Nx Cloud can track when the main job terminates and terminate associated agents automatically.