Hopefully, code reviews are already a part of your software development process. They should be a collaborative, non-judgemental tool for improving code quality and decreasing knowledge silos. Yet instead, they often serve as a source of frustration and fear. But why?
Well, if this was a play we’d have the following parts:
- The code
- The Author
- The Author’s Ego
- The Reviewer
- The Reviewer’s Ego
As you can imagine bringing this cast of characters together can be a challenge! Especially since we want to do so in a way that results in high-quality software. Thus we need a plan, just like any good play has a well-written script.
Let’s look at the following areas and how they contribute to a frustration-free code review:
- Goals
- Pull Requests
- CI Integration
- Giving Comments
- Responding to Comments