Arguably the Automated Builds and Integration Builds (2 of the 12 Basic Software Development Practices) form the hinge upon which software development succeeds or fails.
By having an integration build which is automated you are in the position to close the door on some Level 2 Ignorance. To recap Level 2 Ignorance is when you do not know something and at the same time you are unaware of it. (For more see Five Levels Of Ignorance).
The automated integrated build informs you immediately when certain bugs have been introduced. As such you are no longer Level 2 Ignorant of those bugs because you know of them. Granted you may not be able to fix them and so you are at Level 1 Ignorance, but this is an improvement.
Either you caused them, in which case you will learn something you are doing wrong, which remedies something that would otherwise be Level 3 Ignorance. The same is true if someone else caused the bug, they are not aware of the bug and they are not aware they are doing something wrong which is causing bugs.
Absent this build process, your team would be at Level 3 Ignorance of things that cause bugs. A very dangerous place to be. If you remain there your project will fail.
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