Maintaining the stability and quality of a software product developed by a global team presents a myriad of challenges. A highly serialized build and test process turned out to be inefficient and in many cases detrimental to the health of the product. A system of integrated source control coupled with continuous build and test resulted in higher productivity by the engineering team, a dramatic reduction of “broken” builds, and a regression suite pass rate consistently near 100%. In this presentation we review the circumstances that motivated our move to a continuous build and test model, provide an overview of our continuous build and test system, and discuss the metrics used to monitor system health and drive continual improvements.

Eric Forsberg has more than 25 years of experience in testing and software quality assurance as a tester, test lead, and quality assurance and product engineering manager. Eric’s project experience spans testing and quality assurance for commercial as well as MIL-SPEC compliant software in the areas of computer aided design, electrical design automation, and embedded aircraft engine control and data monitoring systems. For the past 15 years, he has had management responsibilities for quality assurance, configuration management, and product release for software products developed by a diverse worldwide engineering team. Eric is employed at Mentor Graphics Corporation in Wilsonville, Oregon.