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Time to Fix a Broken Build

Learn how to use the DORA Time To Fix A Broken Build metric to improve the speed of your team's pipeline workflow.

Updated over a week ago

  1. What is Time to Fix a Broken Build

  2. Why Time to Fix a Broken Build Matters

  3. How Umano Measures Time to Fix a Broken Build

  4. How Umano Visualises Time to Fix a Broken Build

  5. What's included when calculating Time to Fix a Broken Build

  6. What good results for Time to Fix a Broken Build looks like

  7. Practices that influence and improve Time to Fix a Broken Build

  8. Tips to improve Time to Fix a Broken Build

  9. Common Anti Patterns to Watch Out For When Using Time to Fix a Broken Build

1. What is Time to Fix a Broken Build?

Time to Fix a Broken Build measures the time it takes to resolve and repair a build failure after it has been identified. This metric reflects a team’s responsiveness to issues in the pipeline.

2. Why Time to Fix a Broken Build Matters

Quickly resolving build issues minimizes downtime, maintains team productivity, and ensures a steady flow of value delivery. A fast resolution time also prevents cascading delays across teams and projects.

3. How Umano Measures Time To Fix A Broken Build

The time to fix a broken build is the median time between the completion time of the first broken build and the completion time of the first fixed build in each branch of each repository at each interval.

4. How Umano Visualises Time To Fix A Broken Build

5. What Umano Includes In Time To Fix A Broken Build

  • Number of issues addressed per broken build

  • Number of builds to fix

  • Number of contributors

6. What Good Results for This Metric Look Like

  • Elite Performance: Less than 30 minutes.

  • High Performance: 30 minutes to 1 hour.

  • Medium Performance: 1 to 8 hours.

  • Low Performance: More than 8 hours.

7. Practices That Influence and Improve Time To Fix A Broken Build

  • Immediate Notifications: Set up alerts to quickly inform teams of build failures.

  • Root Cause Analysis: Develop a process to investigate and address failures systematically.

  • Shared Ownership: Foster a culture where everyone is responsible for fixing issues.

  • Version Control Reversion: Use rollback mechanisms to revert problematic changes quickly.

8. Tips to Improve Time to Fix a Broken Build

  • Establish a dedicated on-call rotation to handle build failures promptly.

  • Maintain detailed logs and diagnostics to expedite troubleshooting.

  • Use dashboards to visualize pipeline health and prioritize fixes.

  • Conduct regular training sessions on debugging and incident response.

9. Common Anti-Patterns to Watch Out For When Using Time To Fix A Broken Build

  • Blame Culture: Assigning blame instead of focusing on resolution delays fixes and harms team morale.

  • Delayed Notification: Failing to inform the team about a broken build quickly leads to longer resolution times.

  • Over-Reliance on Individuals: Depending on specific team members creates bottlenecks when they are unavailable.

  • Skipping Root Cause Analysis: Fixing symptoms without addressing underlying issues increases the risk of recurrence.

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