An important part of any software development process is getting reliable builds of the software. Despite its importance, we are often surprised when this isn't done. We understand this aspect and give it due importance.
"Continuous Integration" takes integration, commonly an infrequent and painful exercise, and makes it a simple, core part of a developer's daily activities. Integrating continuously makes integration a part of the natural rhythm of coding, an integral part of the test-code-refactor cycle. Continuous integration is about progressing steadily forward by taking small steps.
We use CruiseControl as the framework for continuous integration.
To summarize, we
- keep a single place where all the source code lives and where anyone can obtain the current sources from (and previous versions),
- automate the build process so that anyone can use a single command to build the system from the sources,
- automate the testing so that you can run a good suite of tests on the system at any time with a single command, and
- make sure anyone can get a current executable which you are confident is the best executable so far.
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