10up uses Code Review to build better WordPress experiences

10up builds custom publishing experiences for their clients across the globe. Their team is distributed around the world, and code review is a key step they use to make sure a project meets their standards. Taylor Lovett, Director of Web Engineering at 10up, said this about reviewing code across their teams: How we work and learn together is really important to the survival of the company. Code reviews are a great way for us to make sure we ship high quality work and share knowledge across our teams.

When Beanstalk launched a beta of their Code Review we invited the team at 10up to try out our new workflow. Before using Beanstalk’s Code Review 10up had an informal approach to reviews, and it was difficult for anyone outside the team to quickly keep track of how a review was progressing. Taylor had this to say about their process, Usually reviews started one of a few ways. When one of our engineers completed their work on a branch, they’d ping one of our tech leads in chat and ask them to review their work. Tech leads also kept tabs on projects as they progressed, so they might check in with a team when they saw a project was about done.

Issues let us track changes separately from comments and see what work is left. We immediately see what work needs to be done without a long conversation thread.

In addition, 10up teams would work through comprehensive reviews, going over their master branch to make sure everything was ready for launch. Every code review was a little different, and keeping a historical record of each review required pulling conversations out of email and chat.

With Code Review from Beanstalk engineers could request a review and Beanstalk took care of notifying reviewers, comments were added in-line to code, and any issues a reviewer identified were tracked and visible. These tools made it much easier for the entire team at 10up to keep track of all of their reviews. Now everything we talk about related to a specific review is in one place. Issues are great because they let us track changes separately from comments and see what work is left for any review. It’s a great way for our team to immediately see what work needs to be done without having to skim a long conversation thread.

I really like how Beanstalk built digest emails for code reviews, so if I’m watching or participating in a review I get a summary view of what’s happening.

Taylor also loves how email digests from Beanstalk have been designed to keep everyone up to date. I really like how Beanstalk built digest emails for code reviews, so if I’m watching or participating in a review I get a summary view of what’s happening. If someone on our team doesn’t want to see notifications they can turn them off for a single review, or manage the settings for all their reviews in Beanstalk.

January 20th, 2015