Kona: Continuous Integration and Better Unit Testing

This screencast went from a simple idea - talking to Brad Wilson about better Unit Testing - to some pretty broad topics such as source control, unit testing, and continuous integration. I seriously could have written a whole book based on the stuff flying through my mind.

Tuesday, April 07, 2009

I reigned it in a bit and decided to focus on two things that I don't think get enough press: writing a good Unit Test coupled with Continuous Integration. It still came in at 50 minutes - oh well. I think it's all good. What I decided to do was to answer the following question:
Why should I care about Unit Tests (aside from being made fun of)? Why should I care in a Business Way?
When talking about Unit Testing (and TDD for that matter) most people will say "yah I know I should be writing more tests." in a "yah I know I shouldn't drink so much beer." sort of way. This isn't really a healthy thing - you shouldn't feel that you need to write tests to be a good person (though a few folks might say so). You're a smart person - and I'd like to respect that and see if I can appeal to your business mind. What if I told you that if you spent some time mastering Unit Tests (coupled with a Build Server) you could:
  • Code in less time
  • Prove you're finished (bug free)
  • Come in under budget
  • Sleep at night

If this sounds interesting to you - this screencast is for you. I should mention this is only an introduction; if what you see here appeals to you I'd like to suggest you get on down to Borders or hit Google to find out more!

The Code is Here

You can download the screencast here