At Google, we’ve found that engineers sometimes need to be persuaded that testing via public APIs is better than testing against implementation details. The reluctance is understandable because it’s often much easier to write tests focused on the piece of code you just wrote rather than figuring out how that code affects the system as a whole. Nevertheless, we have found it valuable to encourage s... [更多...]

Unlike the QA processes of yore, in which rooms of dedicated software testers pored over new versions of a system, exercising every possible behavior, the engineers who build systems today play an active and integral role in writing and running automated tests for their own code. Even in companies where QA is a prominent organization, developer-written tests are commonplace. At the speed and scale... [更多...]

Instead, before you begin writing, you should (formally or informally) identify the audience(s) your documents need to satisfy. A design document might need to persuade decision makers. A tutorial might need to provide very explicit instructions to someone utterly unfamiliar with your codebase. An API might need to provide complete and accurate reference information for any users of that API, be t... [更多...]

Google’s culture, like that of a lot of software companies, is based on giving engineers wide latitude in how they do their jobs. There is a recognition that strict processes tend not to work well for a dynamic company needing to respond quickly to new technologies, and that bureaucratic rules tend not to work well with creative professionals. Code review, however, is a mandate, one of the few bla... [更多...]

Rules are laws. They are not just suggestions or recommendations, but strict, mandatory laws. As such, they are universally enforceable—rules may not be disregarded except as approved on a need-to-use basis. In contrast to rules, guidance provides recommendations and best practices. These bits are good to follow, even highly advisable to follow, but unlike rules, they usually have some room for va... [更多...]

At Google, we use the Goals/Signals/Metrics (GSM) framework to guide metrics creation. 在谷歌，我们使用目标/信号/指标（GSM）框架来指导指标创建。 A goal is a desired end result. It’s phrased in terms of what you want to understand at a high level and should not contain references to specific ways to measure it. A signal is how you might know that you’ve achieved the end result. Signals are things we wou... [更多...]

As your role evolves, all the best practices still apply. You’re still a “servant leader”; you’re just serving a larger group. That said, the scope of problems you’re solving becomes larger and more abstract. You’re gradually forced to become “higher level.” That is, you’re less and less able to get into the technical or engineering details of things, and you’re being pushed to go “broad” rather t... [更多...]

In nascent teams, both roles will sometimes be filled by the same person: a Tech Lead Manager (TLM). On larger teams, an experienced people manager will step in to take on the management role while a senior engineer with extensive experience will step into the tech lead role. Even though manager and tech lead each play an important part in the growth and productivity of an engineering team, the pe... [更多...]

We are also writing this chapter because of the increasing imbalance of power between those who make development decisions that impact the world and those who simply must accept and live with those decisions that sometimes disadvantage already marginalized communities globally. It is important to share and reflect on what we’ve learned so far with the next generation of software engineers. It is e... [更多...]

Your organization understands your problem domain better than some random person on the internet; your organization should be able to answer most of its own questions. To achieve that, you need both experts who know the answers to those questions and mechanisms to distribute their knowledge, which is what we’ll explore in this chapter. These mechanisms range from the utterly simple (Ask questions;... [更多...]