Enterprise Finance System Solutions within Countrywide's
Corporate Accounting division is in charge of developing and maintaining their internal
software. CAWeb, Berretta, CLD, Libor Rate and LedgerReportWebService are ASP.NET
web applications and winforms written in C# and C++ that link multiple systems into
one web portal that hundreds of internal users access daily for reports and loan
information. Countrywide uses Automated Build Studio
to build and deploy these applications to its internal users.
Automated Build Studio Boosts Productivity
Countrywide's Corporate Accounting division faced a lot of manual and time consuming
processes for releasing files and database changes to their Testing, Staging, and
Production environments. "CAWeb has a monthly release schedule with possible hot
fixes. We wanted a way to create a build for a specific release, making sure those
files all work together and that the files tested by Quality Assurance were the
same sent to our production server. This is where Automated Build Studio boosted
our productivity and increased quality," said William Brooks, from Countrywide.
Choosing Automated Build Studio?
William described how they chose Automated Build Studio: "Our department chose Automated
Build Studio after hearing about it by word of mouth. At a previous company, I had
used TestComplete and found it very powerful and easy to use. I heard from a friend
that the makers of TestComplete had a software package that could automate complex
processes for compiling code. We went to the AutomatedQA's website and downloaded
the trial version of Automated Build Studio. We were blown away by the numerous
functions possible within this application. In addition to the easy to use Windows
desktop interface, we also liked the ability to launch builds remotely using the
web interface."
Automating Build and Deployment
Countrywide's Corporate Accounting division has automated a lot of their tedious
processes with Automated Build Studio. Below is a brief summary:
- Create a VB script to decide if a macro has been launched by the web interface or
a nightly build (if in the nightly build a release version is chosen by current
date and time).
- Delete a current web application folder on the build machine.
- Get the latest versions of their CAWeb, Berretta, CLD, Libor Rate and LedgerReportWebService
applications, from Visual SourceSafe for a specific release.
- Compile downloaded files in Visual Studio .NET 2003.
- Get the latest version of all SQL scripts set for release.
- Build an installer that holds all .NET code and SQL scripts for all applications,
using Inno Setup 5, and copying this installer to a network location.
- Email the results of a build to the whole department.
Making Tasks Easier
"All interaction with Automated Build Studio is done through the web interface.
Once the initial setup was completed on the build machine, all developers and administrators
can open the web interface through Internet Explorer and launch a build for a specific
release date. This helps developers test their individual code with all other checked
in code in Visual SourceSafe. When the time is right to create a release candidate,
an administrator can then log into the web interface and create that exact build
with an installer so the intended .NET code and SQL scripts can be installed on
the Quality Assurance, Staging, and Production environments. In addition to the
above, every night we have an automated launch of the current build to ensure that
there are no build errors. This allows us to always make sure that at the end of
the day the .NET code that has been checked into Visual SourceSafe is error free,"
said William.
Overcoming Challenges
William described one particular challenge that they overcame using Automated Build
Studio: "We can now build a single executable that holds all .NET code and SQL scripts,
which can be run to install a specified release. Without Automated Build Studio,
the creation of an installer that holds all of our code would be time consuming
and take too many steps to complete."
Automated Build Studio Benefits
"We have experienced many benefits using Automated Build Studio. The most profound
change to our workflow is the organization of code per release. Because our release
schedule can be weekly, we wanted a way to organize these different releases easily
and effectively. The web interface allows us to create an instance for every release
date. We can then create an installer of a build for any release within minutes.
This helps us closely integrate with Visual SourceSafe and ensures that the specific
files that have been checked into our repository are going to be the files in the
installer," said William.
Improving Product Quality
"The quality of our product has greatly improved due to allowing Quality Assurance
to catch more bugs in the early stages of development," said William.
Time Savings
William explained how Automated Build Studio has saved Countrywide more time: "A
great amount of time has been saved, since we can now easily organize our builds
per release. We can launch an installer in the Quality Assurance, Staging, and Production
environments that can install all files built into the installer within a minute.
Previously we would only pull the specified files one at a time to these environments
and then manually compile them. With the many different changes that get released
for our department, it was a full-time job just promoting code. Now we have two
steps: launching a build and then running the installer on the appropriate environment.
This saves about an hour each day for the Build Manager."
Utilizing the Web Interface
"We primarily use Automated Build Studio's web interface. This helps developers
launch builds without having a complex interface to work with. All that is required
of a developer is to click the build they want and the play button. In addition,
the web interface also allows us to use Windows authentication, which gives us the
reassurance that nobody outside our department can access our code," said William.
Countrywide on Automated Build Studio
"I would highly recommend Automated Build Studio for build management. I have used
other build managers in the past and have found Automated Build Studio to be one
of the best. The close integration with numerous utilities, along with the web interface,
enables Automated Build Studio to be powerful and flexible. Automated Build Studio
can bring together your entire department’s code into one easy-to-use tool," said
William.
Conclusion
Automated Build Studio has allowed Countrywide's Corporate Accounting division to
manage their build and deployment processes. Automated Build Studio's close integration
with numerous utilities, along with the web interface, enables them to easily involve
all developers securely and provides the confidence they need to maintain a large
code base.