Save the code or save the tests?
Blog » A while back during a training session at work, our instructor pitched us a hypothetical question:
Your data centre is on fire, and all your application code is on one drive, and all your tests are on the other drive, and you can only rescue one. What do you do?
Save the application code.
Save the tests.
More recently, out of curiosity, I pitched the same question as a poll on Twitter. On Twitter, roughly 80% of respondents said that they would save the application code and 20% said they would save the tests.
People gave differing reasons for their decisions. Predictably, many respondents said to let it all burn, and some people attempted to justify that choice by asserting that they had backups. But "let it all burn" wasn't one of the provided options and these responses didn't show up in the results, so we can safely ignore those opinions for now.
Most of the remaining respondents seemed to make decisions based on their own assumptions about how detailed and specifi...
Your data centre is on fire, and all your application code is on one drive, and all your tests are on the other drive, and you can only rescue one. What do you do?
Save the application code.
Save the tests.
More recently, out of curiosity, I pitched the same question as a poll on Twitter. On Twitter, roughly 80% of respondents said that they would save the application code and 20% said they would save the tests.
People gave differing reasons for their decisions. Predictably, many respondents said to let it all burn, and some people attempted to justify that choice by asserting that they had backups. But "let it all burn" wasn't one of the provided options and these responses didn't show up in the results, so we can safely ignore those opinions for now.
Most of the remaining respondents seemed to make decisions based on their own assumptions about how detailed and specifi...
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