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And it’s like… what’s the deal with build servers?
The simplest way I can think of to explain a build server is to imagine hiring a brand new developer for each code check in, giving them explicit instructions to accomplish the build, and letting them go at it. Maybe that requires a bit of explanation — the idea of a build server is to provide a reproducible set of instructions/steps to accomplish building your application from start to finish without requiring additional input from the developer checking in the code.
As a developer without a build server, you might be in a situation where you have a project that builds perfectly fine locally, but when another developer attempts to build your latest bits, you encounter compile errors as far as the eyes can see. I unfortunately have experienced such a situation for each project I have pulled from source control (in instances where a build server was not used) — not that I fault the organization, persons, or projects involved — if you don’t know better, you don’t know better.
Once you do know about build servers, I do feel it is important to implement one if at all possible, as they are relatively easy to configure, and once done, an inordinate amount of time can be saved across developers.
I only really see two reasons to not utilize a build server… and one is more of an excuse than a reason. The first…