If you’ve read my blog at all, you know I’m a big proponent of Continuous Integration (CI). For the Subtext project, we use CruiseControl.NET. I’ve written about our build process in the past.

Given the usefulness of having a build server, you can understand my frustration and sadness when our build server recently took a dive. I bought a replacement hard drive, but it was the wrong kind (a rookie mistake on my part, accidentally getting an IDE drive rather than SATA).

Members of the Subtext team such as Simo, Myself, and Scott Dorman have put in countless hours into perfecting the build server. If only we had CI Factory in our toolbelt before we started.

CI Factory is just that, a factory for creating CruiseControl.NET scripts. Scott Hanselman calls it a Continuous Integration accelerator. It bundles just about everything you need for a complete CI setup such as CCNET, NUnit or MbUnit, NCover, etc…

In the latest dnrTV episode, Jay Flowers, the creator of CI Factory, joins hosts Scott Hanselman and Carl Franklin to create a Continuous Integration setup using CI Factory in around an hour.

The project they chose to use as a demonstration is none other than Subtext! Given the number of hours we’ve taken to setup the Subtext build server, this is quite an ambituous undertaking to take, especially while being recorded.

Can you imagine having to write code while two guys provide color commentary? I’d probably wilt under that pressure, but Jay handles it with aplomb.

The video runs a bit long, but is worth watching if you plan to setup CI for your own project. The amount of XML configuration with CIFactory might seem daunting at first, but trust me when I say that it’s much worse for CCNET by itself. CIFactory reduces the amount of configuration by a lot, and Jay is constantly making it easier and easier to setup.

As an aside, Jay Flowers scores big points with me for also being a member of the MbUnit team, my favorite unit testing framework. Kudos to Jay, Scott, and Carl for a great show.