February 2022 Summaries

In engineering teams, many test automation projects fail due to inadequate planning, leading to failed automation projects with unsatisfied return on investment. To set up for success, a team needs to establish a test automation strategy, which involves defining the goal of test automation, assigning ownership to dedicated automation engineers, deciding which test scenarios to automate based on metrics such as risk, value, and cost efficiency, and choosing suitable test automation tools that cater to the team's specific needs. A well-planned test automation strategy is crucial to ensure collaboration among team members, efficient use of resources, and successful implementation of automated testing.

Workflow Recipes provide a ready-made solution for common Workflow tasks, allowing users to access a range of different Recipes along with examples of entire Workflows. The Recipes are curated by Bitrise Engineers and can be accessed via a link in the Workflow Editor, providing inspiration or reusable solutions. Currently an MVP feature hosted on GitHub, Workflow Recipes offer two ways to use them: adding Steps via the Workflow Editor or copy-pasting the bitrise.yml snippet into the app's .yml file. Users are encouraged to provide feedback and suggest areas for further improvement, with options to leave comments on the GitHub repo, Slack channel, or Discuss forum.

As a developer looking to transition from web development to mobile app development, React Native offers a promising solution. By leveraging standard web technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, developers can create cross-platform apps with native-like performance using React Native. However, there are significant differences between mobile and web development, including the need to write platform-specific code for iOS and Android. React Native provides tools such as Platform module and Platform-specific extensions to address these challenges, while also offering features like animations, navigation, and state management. With its large developer community, open-source nature, and ease of accessibility, React Native is an attractive option for developers looking to build mobile apps with JavaScript.

Fintech apps have become more engaging than traditional banking apps, with users spending 10.8 times more time in fintech apps. The key factor in choosing a finance app is user experience, and most traditional banking apps score low on functionality and usability due to complex navigation and outdated UX. Fintech companies prioritize design thinking and deliver innovative solutions by incorporating delightful UX into their app's design and development process. By adopting UX research, designing intuitive UI, offering seamless onboarding processes, prioritizing accessibility for everyone, and ensuring security, traditional banks can improve their mobile banking experience, increase user engagement, and remain competitive in the expanding finance industry.

The internal platform team at Bitrise aims to provide developer teams with everything they need to be highly performant by iterating quickly and scaling confidently without getting bogged down in platform internals. The team has formed a virtual team of volunteers, developed a GitOps-based CD flow using tools like terragrunt, helm, berglas, and Datadog for observability, and successfully validated the idea with production services being developed on top of it. The ultimate goal is to reach a point where all resources needed to run a service are fully automated, allowing developers to create everything they need using a couple of clicks without worrying about platform intricacies. The team consists of engineers from diverse backgrounds working together to build a flexible and easy-to-use platform that conforms to company standards while covering all use cases. They're focusing on creating a scalable project structure, automating resource management flows, and building the internal developer portal's building blocks using tools like Backstage, which has already laid the groundwork for such a portal.