[Smerity]

I was spoiled as my internship January last year with Google was my first introduction to the world of corporate IT. Google as a culture really encourages engineers to follow best practices - "Testing on the Toilet"[1] was always a highlight.

As you say, the emphasis on unit tests is amazing and something not found in a lot of professional companies. When you tell someone you haven't committed your code yet because you're writing unit tests they don't tell you to hurry - it's not considered something you can rush.

Additionally some of the research that has come out of Google Research [2] is stunning and I suggest if people are interested they can keep tabs on new publications via their feed [3]. A lot of their tools and products really are pushing the boundaries of the field they're in, both in complexity and scale, so the "reports from the front line" offer a unique insight.

[1] - http://googletesting.blogspot.com/2008/08/tott-100-and-count... [2] - http://research.google.com/pubs/papers.html [3] - http://research.google.com/pubs/atom.xml