Latest features & highlights

We added a new step to Octopus: Deploy an Azure App Service. This step makes it easier than ever to deploy your Azure web applications. It runs cross-platform, configures app settings and connection strings, and deploys container images.

We improved the compute and storage capabilities of Octopus Cloud so it can scale with you as your requirements change. Octopus Cloud delivers best-in-class file storage (1TB) and the ability to run more concurrent automation tasks.

More Octopus Cloud improvements will follow later in 2021.

We introduced native support for GitHub Actions so you can integrate your GitHub builds and other automated processes with your Octopus workflows. Push your build artifacts to Octopus, create releases, execute runbooks, and more.

The Export/Import Projects feature allows you to move projects from one space to another. With this feature, you can:

• Move projects from a self-hosted Octopus Server to Octopus Cloud.
• Split a multi-project space into multiple spaces.
• Move a project from one space to another, in the same instance or another instance.

We added a search field to the Octopus Web Portal. Find and invoke actions with a few keystrokes, and navigate to server-side resources with ease.

Global Search benefits all Octopus users. It helps first-time users gain confidence with Octopus and find what they need even when they don’t know where to look, and it allows advanced users to navigate even faster than before.

The Octopus Tentacle agent now supports ARM and ARM64 hardware. This update makes it possible to deploy your apps and services to Raspberry Pi 3 and 4, AWS A1 EC2 instances, and any ARM hardware that can run .NET Core 3.0 or later.

We are publishing our Octopus Server Linux Docker images so teams can self-host Octopus in a Linux Docker container. This image is based on the same code that powers Octopus Cloud, so you can self-host Octopus on your operating system of choice.

Octopus Cloud provides built-in Worker Pools with dynamic workers to execute scripts against your services and infrastructure. This update adds better cross-platform support with images for Windows 2019 and Ubuntu 20.04. All worker images support Execution Containers which provide the ability to simplify dependency management and streamline automation tooling.

Octopus now supports automatic configuration file updates configuration updates for JSON, YAML, XML and Properties files.

We’re adding better configuration file updates with support for YAML, XML, and property files. This makes it much easier to update any Java application files as well as numerous other platforms that use YAML and XML.

We’ve updated our runbook automation support based on customer-driven feedback.

• Runbook-only projects allow you to create operations focused projects.
• Octopus CLI support with the run-runbook command so you can execute runbooks from the command-line or scripts.
• Advanced control over runbook run settings, including environment scoping, retention policies, and guided failure support per runbook.

Our Jenkins plugin now supports Jenkins Pipelines. You can now integrate Jenkins with Octopus from your Jenkinsfile without scripting it yourself. Push packages, create and deploy releases as well as execute runbooks.

We updated our process editor to streamline the editing process with better visibility and fewer clicks. You can now see the entire deployment process to simplify navigation and make it easier to reference other step names in scripts and variables. It also allows you to edit your entire process, including updating multiple steps and saving all your changes with a single click.

Execution containers for Workers let you execute deployment work in isolation without the need to manage dependencies and containers.

We're shipping cross-platform Docker images pre-configured with the latest tools and frameworks for your deployments and runbooks.

Octopus now provides initial change management integration with Jira Service Desk that lets teams create change requests during their deployments automatically.

Developers, DevOps personnel, and operations folks love dark mode, and we’ve built a custom Octopus dark theme that is easier on your eyes.

The Octopus CLI lets you interact with an Octopus instance from a build server or local workstations. Developers can install it quickly with popular Linux and macOS package managers like Homebrew, APT, and YUM.

Operations runbooks automate routine maintenance and emergency operations tasks like infrastructure provisioning, database management, and website failover and restoration.

This feature was designed to make modeling and executing operations tasks feel as natural as deploying applications does today. It brings support to execute Runbooks directly against infrastructure and includes strong scheduling support.

We built Runbooks with teams in mind. Runbooks can be parameterized with prompted variables, and you can make changes with confidence, publishing only once they have been safely tested.

Octopus has long supported deploying applications to Linux via SSH; however, some companies operate in highly secure environments where it's not possible to open port 22 on production servers. Our customers faced scenarios where applications exist in their own DMZs with no incoming connections permitted other than HTTPS for web traffic.

We're making this scenario possible with Tentacle agent for Linux. Tentacle is a lightweight service that enables secure communication between the Octopus Server and deployment targets in a listening and polling modes. In polling mode, it contacts the Octopus Server and executes deployment work as required including retrieving application packages and deployment scripts.

Our new Octopus plugin for Jira Cloud enables teams to see the status of their releases and deployments directly in their Jira issues with deep links back to Octopus for further details. This enables greater visibility and insight for your team and company in the tool that they're most comfortable with.

Software usually runs through a CI/CD pipeline on its way to production. Developers push code to repositories like GitHub, and build servers like Azure DevOps and TeamCity, build it, and finally, Octopus deploys it. Traditionally, the linkages between each of those steps can get lost.

With the introduction of our build information and work item tracking, it’s now possible to see build, commit and issue details directly in Octopus. This allows teams to view the issues and build details that contributed to a release giving end-to-end traceability from issue to production. You can even click deep links for more information.

Release notes are a great way to help your team and customers understand what’s new in production. This is generally a manual process and can involve talking to numerous teams and reviewing project tracking tools and source code repos.

Octopus has simplified this process by leveraging metadata from your source code commits and build process to determine what’s new in an environment. It can show you which issues and changes are new since your last deployment. You can even share this with your team on Slack or send it to your customers via email.

This feature shipped with support for GitHub Issues, Jira Issues, and Azure DevOps work items.

Spaces is a new way to organize your Octopus Server, making it easy to group your projects, environments and most other things into a space for each team. It’s like moving teams from a large open plan office to private offices.

Spaces are useful for teams who have a large number of projects, environments, or tenants, and often have trouble finding the resources that are important to them. They eliminate distractions and enable teams to focus on what matters to them.

Another great benefit of Spaces is that it is a permissions boundary, simplifying the configuration of teams and roles. Octopus Server admins can delegate responsibility to “Space Managers” who are given full access to manage a space. They can define who is allowed to deploy to production and do other things within their space, without affecting teams in other spaces.

Octopus helps teams adopt and scale Kubernetes. Teams new to Kubernetes can use our rich step templates to get started quickly, and experienced teams can pick the strategy that suits them: full-control with kubectl or first-class HELM support. You can work with as much or as little YAML as you prefer, and time-saving deployment strategies help you get started faster.

Our Kubernetes support builds upon Octopus fundamentals that enable you to deploy releases in a repeatable and reliable manner. Things like promoting releases through environments like Dev and Test before deploying to Production, comprehensive variable management with scoping rules and secret storage, and separating the design time process of building a deployment from the deploy time process of selecting package versions. What this means is that as you roll out new versions of your containers and Octopus will update your YAML for you.

All of these features enable teams to create a roadmap for adopting Kubernetes that works for them.