Goals: Be able to build in one step: eg, shouldn't need to run multiple scripts and commands to build a project shouldn't need to build dependancies, should be worked out by single build step resource for reading: http://www.xs4all.nl/~evbergen/nonrecursive-make.html Have daily builds: Automatically check out and build the code nightly (or during the day) Also if the same system can run through automated test suite Joel Test: Can you make a build in one step? Yes Do you make daily builds? cron