Continuous integration and buildserver
Filed under: Configuration Management, Management, Ubuntu
So, I finally got around to trying out continuous integration and got a buildserver at home. Ok, not much use on any 1-man projects, but should be good enough for some testing at least. I’m currently using cruisecontrol for it, and so far so good. I’ve got a few points I sincerely react against, but I’ll get back to that a bit later.
For those not knowing what continuous integration is, I suggest reading the above link. Basically, when you run a project, you always run into some “final” integration problems. People have coded each on their own side, and you wind up having to “integrating” the code so that it all works as supposed. In the one extreme, you have everyone coding on their own tree from start to end, and then you finally have an integration session. In this shitty situation, you have no clue how long it will take. On the other extreme, you have “perfect” continuous integration, where every single line of code is tested and checked that it doesnt screw things up.
A buildserver such as cruisecontrol is an excellent tool for doing “good” continuous integration. What it does is as follows, it connects to your central code repository, checks for any changes. If there was changes, it downloads them, and then rebuilds the project(s). If you have done it properly, you also have a ton of tests that you can run on the project. This is then reported or output in several different ways. Did it fail, did it succeed, and so forth.
I might be able to convince my new project manager to use a cruisecontrol server for the project I am working on at the moment, and he sounds like he likes the idea. We just need to consider everything for this project, and I need to figure out just how it works and how to configure it etc etc etc =) . Either way, I think it will be interesting to find out more about this type of development, and to see if it actually changes the development in any large way.
Oh, yes, I currently got two things I need to figure out with cruisecontrol. If I got it right, it doesn’t support GNU Make. Not supporting make seems… well, to be honest, totally stupid. It’s been one of the biggest make systems for 20 years or more, so there’s bound to be like 500000+ projects out there already running Make. I know it’s an old system, but it works, and it’s there already.
The second thing, I’m not totally certain of this, but subversion support seems to be abysmal. I need to look more at it however to find out the lay of the land or something.
Re: “Miljövän rasar mot flygshow”
http://www.gp.se/gp/jsp/Crosslink.jsp?d=113&a=442174
I need to comment on this news story as it really annoyed me.
I’ve personally grown up with airplanes and airshows very close to me as my father was a pilot, I have quite a few old friends that are pilots, and I’ve always been interested in airplanes and I admit that this might have coloured my perspective very heavily. However, the hypocrisy and bullshit, if you excuse my language, that Lotta Holmberg spews forth is just plain wrong.
Before she even considers throwing stones in her own glass house, she should contemplate how she herself is living. She’s even so mentally deficit as to admit that she hasn’t even stopped her “yearly trip to the sun”. Now, let’s do some really simple math on this.
Let’s consider how many people get anything from a trip with a charter airplane “to the sun”, approximately 200-500, let’s say 400 to err on her side. Average trip time from this country to “a place in the sun” would be approximately 5-6 hours airtime, so a grand total of 12 hours both ways. Split the airtime per passenger, 12/400 which turns into 1.8 minutes per person on the airplane.
Now, let’s consider the airshow. There was a grand total of maximum 6 hours or so of airshows per day, average of 3-4 airplanes in the air at all times (rounding to 4 to be nice to you), so a grand total of 6*2*4 = 48 hours in the air during the whole airshow. 45000 persons visited the airshow and had a great time, making for a total of 48/45000 hours per person and which turns into… tada, a massive 3,84 seconds airtime per visitor.
To make it simple, let’s make the assumption “all airplanes turns out as much green gases as any other” (your charter aircraft is gigantic in comparison and shiny new with perfect green engines (yeah as if, you freakin mooch going with the cheapest 30 year old crap airplanes on the market and still flying commercially), while “mine” at the airshow are very small, but at the same time very old so probably having a bad efficiency with a big exhaust of gases in comparison to their engine size). So, 1.8 minutes = 108 seconds, divided by 3.84 seconds, 28.125x less gas output per person in comparison to your “yearly trip to the sun”.
I got about 50 other reasons why airshows are a good thing and needs to be there, and why you should keep your mouth shut. Please stop throwing stones in a glass house and stop putting your feets in your own mouth.
Now, if you excuse me, I need to visit 420 airshows to use up as much green gases as you have done with your “yearly trips to the sun” — calculated based on you being old enough to have been on 15 “yearly trips to the sun” vs Göteborg Aero show.