Quick prod releases and what can go (horribly) wrong Joseph Shambrook - January 2019

I’m Joe

Front End Developer at

Here to talk about a pretty bad, yet simple, mistake I made once

Mistakes are GOOD

Why? ● You learn from them ● Highlight undetected problems ● Usually reversible

My true story It’s okay to laugh

Front End Developer at an e-commerce website

Used by thousands of people every day

My job: Creating A/B tests to improve the user experience* *make more money

Incredibly fast-paced environment

Fast and common releases to Production

Best practice was sacrificed

● Code reviews were optional ● Coding standards were ignored ● Old tests were not removed ● No automated testing at all I’m not joking

The checkout process was spread across separate pages

Basket Review Personal Details Delivery Details Payment Details Final Review

Basket Review Personal Details Delivery Details Payment Details Final Review

FORM SUBMIT SIDEBAR

FORM SIDEBAR SUBMIT

Started code review Merged to master Pushed to Production Started test

Intermission: HTML Forms 101

<form /> Name Birthday Favourite PHP function <button type=”submit” />

<form /> Name Birthday Favourite PHP function

FORM SIDEBAR SUBMIT

Basket Review Personal Details Delivery Details Payment Details Final Review

Basket Review Personal Details Delivery Details Payment Details Final Review WTF

The result?

What did we I learn?

Best practice exists for a reason

● Carry out code reviews ● Follow coding standards ● Remove redundant code ● Write automated tests

Anyone can make a mistake

● Support and understand ● Help to teach to avoid a recurrence

Thank you! Connect with me on LinkedIn! - josephshambrook