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Introduction
Continuous integration (CI) is a process by which your codebase is compiled and tests are run on every check in (at very least). From Martin Fowler's
definitive paper on the subject:
Continuous Integration is a software development practice where members of a team integrate their work frequently, usually each person integrates at least daily - leading to multiple integrations per day. Each integration is verified by an automated build (including test) to detect integration errors as quickly as possible. Many teams find that this approach leads to significantly reduced integration problems and allows a team to develop cohesive software more rapidly. This article is a quick overview of Continuous Integration summarizing the technique and its current usage.
EditTools
CruiseControl.NET is a popular option for a continuous integration server. You can read the documentation
here (
download).
Jet Brains TeamCity was recently released the Professional Edition as freeware and provides CI services via a web interface. You can download the latest version
here. TeamCity is released for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, and as a Java EE container.
Jay Flowers created
CIFactory, a tool that greatly eases the process of setting up a CI environment. If you're just getting started with CI,
CIFactory is a great place to start and comes highly recommended.
EditBooks
Continuous Integration: Improving Software Quality and Reducing Risk (The Addison-Wesley Signature Series)CruiseControl.NET DocumentationContinuous Integration For .NET 2.0 Development Environments: Downloadable Booklet (Carel Lotz)
A free downloadable booklet (fully searchable PDF format with PDF bookmarks and links) on setting up CI in a .NET 2.0 development environment using tools like CruiseControl.NET, MSBuild, MSBuild.Community.Tasks, FxCop, TypeMock, NUnit, NCover, NDepend, Subversion, Installshield, Mercury QuickTest Professional and Sandcastle. Source code of the build files and the proposed directory structure as illustrated in the guide are also available.
Continuous Integration For .NET 3.5 Development Environments: Downloadable Booklet (Carel Lotz)
A free downloadable booklet (fully searchable PDF format with PDF bookmarks and links) on setting up CI in a .NET 3.5 development environment using tools like CruiseControl.NET, MSBuild, MSBuild.Community.Tasks, FxCop, NUnit/MbUnit, NCover, TypeMock/Rhino.Mocks, NDepend, Subversion, WiX, and Sandcastle. Source code of the build files and the proposed directory structure as illustrated in the guide are also available.
EditBlog Posts
Using Continuous Integration? Better do the "Check In Dance" (Jeremy Miller)
Proper build and code hygiene is important, and no one wants to be the "broke the build again" guy.
Continuous Integration: From Theory to Practice (Carel Lotz)
A practical guide for implementing Continuous Integration in a .NET 2.0 Development Environment
Continuous Integration: From Theory to Practice - 2nd Edition (Carel Lotz)
A practical guide for implementing Continuous Integration in a .NET 3.5 Development Environment
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