8 parts · 13 chapters
Code Review and Merge Discipline
Code review is where a team's standards are actually set: not in the style guide, but in what reviewers approve. Done well it spreads knowledge, catches the bugs tests miss, and teaches; done badly it is a slow gate that argues about commas.
Eight parts: what review is for and not for; an order for reading a pull request; writing feedback people act on; receiving feedback; PR size, stacking and descriptions; merge strategies and branch protection; review at scale with owners, SLAs, bots and AI reviewers; and review as teaching and as a staff signal.
purposeCorrectness, design, knowledge sharing and standards, in that order.
readingDescription, tests, the core change, then the rest.
feedbackSpecific, kind, labelled by severity, with the why.
sizeSmall PRs, stacked changes, descriptions that explain.
mergingMerge, squash and rebase; protected branches and required checks.
scaleCODEOWNERS, review SLAs, bots and AI reviewers.
00
What Review Is For
Five purposes, ranked · What review is not
2 ch · ~12 min01Reviewing a PR: An Order of Reading
Six steps · A checklist for risky changes
2 ch · ~12 min02Writing Feedback People Act On
Six kinds of comment · Patterns that make review painful
2 ch · ~12 min03Receiving Feedback
On the other side
1 ch · ~8 min04PR Size, Stacking and Descriptions
Size and stacking · A description that does the work
2 ch · ~12 min05Merge Strategies and Branch Protection
Three strategies · Protection and merge queues
2 ch · ~12 min06Review at Scale: Owners, SLAs, Bots and AI Reviewers
Scaling review across many teams
1 ch · ~8 min07Review as Teaching and as a Staff Signal
Review that multiplies
1 ch · ~8 minPairs with Big-company FE and AI-nativeBig-company FE part 7 covered review culture; AI-native part 4 covered agent PR critique. This course is the craft itself.