Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
information does not always need to be continuous, but it should be on
some type of schedule.
The Right People
Everyone needs to receive some type of feedback on the project, but
not necessarily every item
every
time. With a little bit of planning, you
can devise a strategy for distributing the type of information your CI
system can generate. Sometimes a message simply informs members
that everything is going fine, which is great, but you don't want a sea
of “fine” messages burying a “not fine” message in its depths. Sending
feedback to all project members too often will ensure that everyone
begins to ignore the messages. Also, notifying a whole group about
something that only one or two team members can fix creates undesir-
able bulk—what if all developers receive an error based on what a sin-
gle developer just checked in? They may begin to see so many
messages that they don't notice when one of them is in their area. It is
important that your team doesn't learn to ignore messages from the CI
build process altogether.
Beware of Information Overload
Sending feedback to everyone on a project usually only causes
everyone to ignore the information.
CI helps get the right information to the right people, which is
really the
right role.
On some projects, one person may serve multiple
roles. Depending on your role, you may receive communications from
the CI system in different ways.
•
Project Manager
—A project manager (PM) must often make
decisions that center on resource allocation (people, hardware,
and supplies), time, and costs. PMs are usually managing many
tasks at once, so they need high-level, real-time feedback on
software completion as it relates to time, cost, quality, and scope.
A CI system can be most effective at providing much of this
feedback because of its automated and continuous nature.
