It seems like everywhere I’ve turned this week, I’ve run into articles about Continuous Integration. Seems to me like this is another concept that, like static analysis, is really starting to pick up steam. First, I opened my copy of SD Times to read Andrew Binstock’s weekly column, which starts out:

One of the most important trends emerging in software development is the adoption of continuous integration. While developers, especially agile developers, have known of the benefits of continuous integration since the late 1990s, only now is it starting to gain real traction.

Binstock goes on to talk about how you can use your CI server to run unit tests, collect coverage data and run static analysis.

Then I read Jez Humble’s piece on the ThoughtWorks blog about CI. At heart, he says, CI tools are really timers that kick off the build process. But there’s more to CI than the build, Humble says, and he then goes on to detail six key things you should automate as part of the CI process. Worth a read.

Finally, if you are in the DC area, you might want to check out Stelligent’s CI War Stories session that they are holding at their office this evening. I heard that all over the country, people are already in line outside retail outlets, eagerly anticipating the June 29 release of Paul Duvall’s book Continuous Integration: Improving Software Quality and Reducing Risk. Oh wait, maybe that’s something else they are waiting in line for.