I've got a small application (https://github.com/tkoomzaaskz/cherry-api) and I would like to integrate it with travis. In fact, travis is probably not important here. My question is how can I configure a build/job to execute the following sequence:
- start the server that serves the application
- run tests
- close the server (which means close the build)
The application is written in python/CherryPy (basic webapp framework). On my localhost I do it using two consoles. One runs the server and another one runs the tests - it's pretty easy and works fine. But when I want to execute all this in the CI environment, I fall in trouble - I'm unable to gain control after the server is started, because the server process waits for requests... and waits... and waits... and tests are never run (https://travis-ci.org/tkoomzaaskz/cherry-api/builds/10855029 - this build is infinite). Additionally, I don't know how to close the server. This is my .travis.yml:
before_script: python src/hello.py
script: nosetests
src/hello.py starts the built-in CherryPy server (listens on localhost:8080). I know I can move it to the background by adding the &: before_script: python src/hello.py & but then I shall find the process ID in the CI-environment and kill the process which seems very very dirty solution and I guess there's something better than that.
I'd appreciate any hints on how can I configure this.
edit: I've configured this dirty run in the background and then kill the process in this file. The build passes now. Still, I think it's ugly...