Brugge Blog

Nicely in the spirit of Live CDs, ThoughtWorks has given build masters an interesting jumpstart: Buildix. Sure, it’s more than just a build master tool, since it’s aimed at creating a whole team support environment (Subversion source control, Trac bug tracking/wiki, and CruiseControl for builds), but the person who typically sets these things up is the one who wears the role of build master. And learning about tools after they are running is usually a more satisfying experience than learning all about them in order to get them running.

It’s a great idea, and I hope it finds it way into places that want to get started with an useful team suite without too much hassle. Or someone could sneak it in as a low cost skunk works to draw some attention to lightweight environments. Either way is a win.

I do wonder, though, how many shops are (a) missing all of these components, and (b) willing to run them on a Linux server. In terms of hardware and software cost, it certainly seems like it would make sense, but the reality of many shops is that Linux is a political item, and if you haven’t won that battle yet, Buildix is just another tantalizing offer that you can’t reach.