Branching strategy for working with outsourced team?

Question

I am planning to manage an outsourced dev team working on my codebase by having that team work in feature branches for all the work they have been assigned. They would be responsible for merging changes from the trunk weekly. My own team would also continue to use feature branching as required.

Does anyone have any tips based on experience integrating outsourced work using a particular branching strategy?

Answer 1

It has been my experience that when working with outsourced development teams it is best to avoid development processes that involve too many manual steps. If there is confusion about how to resolve a merge issue then they will have to communicate this to you or a member of your insourced team and that will slow everybody down.

Most outsourced teams I have dealt with were in India so you have the time zone difference as a challenge, their work day usually ends when yours begins unless you have a pricey team that works EST, central, mountain pacific times. The communication issues are just killer and most of the time I would come in the next day to find they accomplished nothing because they couldn't figure something out without my direct help.

Merging is generally frowned upon but I have personally only seen it work in close knit teams with intermediate to senior developers.