Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Perform Distributed Integration Builds
If you have an extremely large code base and you've tried adding more
processing speed, memory, and disk speed to the integration build
machine, and you've also attempted to reduce build duration in other
ways, including reducing the frequency of component and system
tests, but the build still takes too long, then you should consider per-
forming distributed integration builds.
There are integration build tools that specialize in leveraging the
power of multiple machines. BuildForge
7
and ParaBuild
8
are tools that
provide features for distributing integration builds. There are also con-
tributions to other CI servers, such as CruiseControl; however, distrib-
uted integration builds are a complex problem with an even more
complex solution. Moving part of the build to another machine may
mean copying large files around as part of the build process, which has
the potential to slow things down even more. Try to exercise all other
options for reducing your build duration
before
attempting this solution.
Reevaluate
We have discussed several approaches, including improvements to test
performance, the build process, hardware capacity, and design. Which
improvements did you try and what is the build's duration now? It's
time now to try the improvement with the rest of the team and gauge
whether an additional improvement cycle is necessary. If you have
already gone through this process once, repeating the improvement
cycle should be less time-consuming and less painful.
At this point, you may agree that by executing an integration build
with every change to the software you can reduce many risks on a
project. However, you may be thinking, “This works fine on
your
7. See
www.buildforge.com
for more information.
8. See
www.viewtier.com/products/parabuild/index.htm
for details.
