You'll normally use some tokens that evaluates dynamically to some interesting values, such as the unique sequential number, Subversion revision ID, git branch name, formatted build timestamp, etc. The token expansion mechanism is provided by the Token Macro Plugin and therefore extensible. You can click the help button on the right to see the tokens available in your Jenkins.

You also could set a build name at any point of the build process in order to do that just add a setter build step to your job:

New build name consists of text file content and macro (which is also evaluated using Token Macro Plugin):

<file_if_defined><macro_if_defined>

you could change the order by checking a checkbox "Insert macro first" so build will be:

<macro_if_defined><file_if_defined>

After the build name is set it looks like this:

Also note that the build name can be manually modified any time through the UI. People interested in this plugin may be also interested in the Description Setter Plugin, which does similar things for build description and instead of the name.

History

Version 1.6.9 (Mar 03, 2018)

• JENKINS-39674 - Prevent file descriptor leak in the "Update Build Name" step

Version 1.6.8 (Jan 16, 2018)

• JENKINS-48944 - Make the plugin compatible with Jenkins 2.102+
  • More info: Plugins affected by fix for JEP-200
•  PR #16 - Stop logging cases when the environment variable gets modified with the same value 

Version 1.6.7 (Jul 12, 2017)

• JENKINS-33527 - Prevent concurrency issues in Environment VarSetter
•   PR #15 - Update minimal core requirement to 1.609 and fix issues

Version 1.6.6 - skipped

Version 1.6.5 (Apr 24, 2016)

• Fix JENKINS-34415 - Fixed bug with broken backward compatibility
• Fix JENKINS-33687 - Fixed bug with BUILD_DISPLAY_NAME environment variable not updated

Version 1.6.3 (Apr 16, 2016)

• Fix JENKINS-34181 - Fixed bug with NPE
• From this versin the plugin is also available in Jucies UC (alternative update center). It means that you can install Jucies Plugin on your Jenkins client (follow these steps https://github.com/jucies/releases) and get the most recent version of this plugin faster. Please note that page of Jucies plugin is not available at the moment because of maintenance.

Version 1.6.0 (Apr 11, 2016)

• Fix JENKINS-31681 - Fix bug with optional token-macro dependency

Version 1.5.1 (Nov 11, 2015)

• Fixed bug with file name check (requires Jenkins 1.426)

Version 1.5 (Nov 3, 2015) is potentially broken

• Added setter build step to set build name at any point of the build process (requires Jenkins 1.426)

Version 1.3 (Aug 2, 2011)

• Made to work correctly with matrix projects (requires Jenkins 1.426)

Version 1.2

• Added description for update center

Version 1.0 (Mar 1, 2011)

• First release