Agenda:

Who was there ?

VeraPeeters, PascalVanCauwenberghe, KoenDeHondt, RikTytgat, DirkVerleysen, ErikGroeneveld, StijnVanVreckem, KristofSeurinck?, WinstonWolff?, JeroenMostert, WimEngels, MarcEvers, Ward Van Looy, WillemVanDenEnde, BartDeMan?, MartineVerluyten, StevenMertens?, DietherSamaey?, Jean-Christophe Mincke, FilipLambrechts,Pierre Radermecker, ErikBos?, MaricaLjesar?, JoDesmet?, BrunoAeyels?

Meeting Notes:

All of the companies presenting their experiences in ContinuousIntegrationInPracticeExamples have a regular, automated build-test-integration process. They find it is essential to get rapid feedback on any build/integration/test problems that arise, before the problems become too big. Software is built at least nightly, some companies integrate several times a day. Some, using SmallTalk?, do it so often they don't even call it integration. :-)

There are some differences in the "reward/punishment" methods: some teams single out an individual as the cause of failed integrations; most teams see it as a shared responsibility of the whole team. In any case, the first priority of the team each day is to ensure the integration works. We want to have working software all the time.

Continuous integration is not easy. Some of the obstacles:

  • Building a lot of software takes a long time
  • The software may have to be built on several platforms
  • Deploying software can be difficult
  • Running (unit and functional) tests can take a long time
Integration is hard. But we can't avoid it. So we'd better get good at it as fast as possible. And automate it as much as possible. And do it as often as we can.

Related pages: XpBeMeeting