Creating a Culture of Code Quality

Quality isn't something that just happens, even with the best engineers. It requires bottom-up and top-down support in the engineering organization, champions to drive it forward, and a clear vision to sustain it.

Quality can be thought of concentric circles of increasing scope.

Compilation: Use an opinionated compiler and make it run in a strict mode.

Linting: Build or use an AST linter to enforce coding styles and conventions.

Unit tests: Verify function and object contracts in a sandboxed environment.

Integration tests: Blackbox testing of application functionality ensures core product flows are working before deployment.

Build tools: Enable developers to leverage all of the above seamlessly with a high quality build system.

Documentation: Reduce the overhead of 1on1 training and make it easy for people to self-improve.

Culture: Quality is the responsibility of every engineer.