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Bitrise Strengthens Mobile Development for GitHub Users

In a significant advancement for mobile app developers using GitHub, Bitrise, a leading DevOps platform specializing in mobile app development, has unveiled its latest offering, the Bitrise Build Hub. This innovative CI (Continuous Integration) infrastructure is designed to maximize development efficiency while minimizing the complexities traditionally associated with mobile app builds. With this launch, Bitrise aims to address the performance deficits that have long plagued the mobile development community on GitHub.

Faster Builds with Advanced Infrastructure

Bitrise Build Hub provides developers access to some of the fastest MacOS machines available (M4 Pro), preconfigured build environments, and automatic Xcode updates. The primary allure here is the promise of enhanced speed—developers can significantly reduce the time it takes to build mobile applications by leveraging this state-of-the-art infrastructure.

Barnabas Birmacher, co-founder and CEO of Bitrise, expressed the core aim of the platform: “Bitrise has spent a decade solving mobile development challenges, and now we deliver our fast, reliable, and secure infrastructure capabilities to the entire GitHub community.” With Build Hub, developers can continue utilizing GitHub Actions as their CI orchestrator while redirecting their workflows to Bitrise’s robust mobile app development infrastructure.

Bridging the Performance Gap

Historically, GitHub’s Hosted Runners have fallen short in providing the essential mobile toolchains and processing power necessary to address complex builds. Previously, the only workaround was to rely on cost-prohibitive, self-hosted Mac fleets, which often involved tedious system administration tasks and ultimately slowed down overall development cycles. The introduction of Bitrise Build Hub represents a streamlined solution to these ongoing issues, allowing teams to focus more on development and less on infrastructure management.

Positive Performance Metrics

Initial feedback from early adopters indicates striking performance improvements. According to Daniel Gilbert, a Mobile DevOps Developer at ForeFlight, even smaller virtual machines report up to a 30% increase in speed over GitHub's XL macOS Hosted Runners. Notably, this speed enhancement is crucial for developers seeking agile development cycles and fast iterations.

Key Benefits of Bitrise Build Hub

Recent analysis comprising millions of anonymous builds on the Bitrise platform reveals that teams utilizing this managed infrastructure have experienced an average 28% reduction in build times compared to traditional methods—a remarkable statistic that underscores the efficiency of Bitrise Build Hub.

Among the major advantages of this new service:

• - Rapid Iteration: Utilizing the latest Apple silicon M4 Pro and M2 Pro machines, Bitrise allows for quicker building times. The virtual machines are always ready, leading to reduced build and feedback waiting times.
• - No Maintenance Hassle: Bitrise takes care of hardware, virtualization, operating system updates, and swift installations of new Xcode versions within 24 hours of Apple's release. This alleviates the often burdensome maintenance of Mac virtualization.
• - Mobile-Ready Development Stacks: The infrastructure comes pre-equipped with essential tools, including Xcode, iOS simulators, Android emulators, and various mobile development frameworks.
• - Cost-Effective Performance: Bitrise offers granular scaling with up to 192 vCPUs and multiple instance types, ensuring that teams can select configurations that align with their budgets and workloads.
• - Optional Build Caching: This feature complements existing build caches for Xcode, Gradle, and Bazel, eliminating redundant processing tasks.

Looking Forward

As Bitrise continues to innovate, it reinforces its mission of creating a seamless development experience for mobile app creators. Since its inception in 2014, Bitrise has become a trusted partner for over 8,000 brands, including Shopify, TripAdvisor, and BuzzFeed. By unifying essential tools, processes, and testing frameworks, it empowers mobile development teams to deliver top-notch applications rapidly and effectively. For more insights into Bitrise Build Hub, visit bitrise.io.