Always "Releasable"

Recently I was trying to describe code that is always releasable.

One simple criteria is if someone came to a developer and said "We are going to doing a build this afternoon and release it to the public" the developer would not say "Well you need to wait because I need to go back in and change _____".

Can code be inter-iteration releasable? That is, right in the middle of the iteration can a build be made to release? It can be. I have found because of troublesome code merging issues caused by source control I often check in things that are not complete or done. These things compile and even pass their tests but the task is not finished. I check in often because I have had significant "fights" with source control not recognizing "new items" because the project file was modified by another developer, etc. If the "sand box" or "shelf set" were better I would not be inclined to check in to the main line of the code until the task was complete.

So, code can be always releasable if only completed tasks are checked-in. Incomplete tasks are safely backed up and stored in a sand box or shelf set or jump drive or something.