Starting a career in software development arena haven’t been easy for me. I am a self-taught programmer with a Bachelor Degree in Logistic and Operation from Southern New Hampshire University. It is been almost two years since I first created my first Hello World application. Honestly, the last two years have been pretty much daunting, and I was really scared of the career path I choose. I would always ask myself, am I doing things the right way? am I really programming or I am just adding things up? The truth is I was doing, but not the right way. Actually, I did not know until I joined Andela Bootcamp, where learned about cutting-edge software testing tools.
One of the criteria in Andela Bootcamp was writing tests. It was not my first time to come across TDD (Test Driven Development), but honestly, It was my first time to hear about CI (Continous integration). Basically, TDD is the process of writing block of codes that test, define and confirm the behavior of a software (DevIQ, 2018). On another hand, CI is a process of automating software testing in a way that every time a team member commits changes to a version control (e.g: Git) it triggers build and run tests automatically (Samgu, 2017).
Apart from TDD and CI, Andela challenge instructions indicated that we were also supposed to use tools like Travis-CI, Coveralls, and CodeClimate and obtain their GitHub Badges. Badges are these small SVG images used by developers who are passionate about writing great code to communicate the level at which their code adhere to high standards.
After writing passing tests, integrating CI, and obtaining GitHub badges from mentioned CI tools, the magic happened. I call it magic because for the first time I felt confident about sharing my co-debase, and felt open to any kind of feedback. As a self-taught program, I always felt like my code are flawed as I don’t have a degree or any official training. However, by using these amazing tools, I realized that when you commit to good practices and use the right tools, regardless that background you always deliver a high standard work.
I would say that the most interesting tools I encountered during Andela Boot Camp preparation were TDD and CI. They really helped me to overcome the anxiety I usually had about sharing my code . They also pushed me to adheres to a high standard level of coding. They left me with a habit of always keeping a compliant code-base for every single project I will work on in the future.
Reference
DevIQ. (2018). Test Driven Development Explained. Retrieved from https://deviq.com/test-driven-development/
Samgu, G. (2017, April 4). What is Continuous Integration? — Azure DevOps. Retrieved from https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/learn/what-is-continuous-integration
