How Google Uses Bathroom Breaks to Improve Developer Knowledge and Productivity

Tech on the Toilet is a weekly one-page publication about software development that is posted in bathrooms in Google offices worldwide and is read by tens of thousands of Google engineers.

It is one of the most effective ways to quickly spread software development knowledge across Google. It covers topics such as code quality tips, unit testing best practices, and developer productivity tools.

This talk will give an overview of the Tech on the Toilet program, and share lessons learned that can be applied at other companies.

Take it further with Develocity

Andrew and Kanu describe how a small group of Google engineers successfully spread testing best practices to thousands of fellow engineers, ultimately changing and improving attitudes towards testing and code quality. One important takeaway from this talk—having smart people and good tooling is not enough. It’s equally important to share best practices and educate engineers how to effectively use the tools available to them. Develocity is one such tool that helps speed up build times, reduce time spent troubleshooting, and provide visibility into productivity bottlenecks, and Gradle’s DPE University provides free training on how to make the most of Develocity’s suite of features.

Learn more

Meet the speakers

Andrew Trenk

Andrew has been a software engineer at Google since 2008, mainly on Google Search and Ads.

Andrew is involved in various efforts at Google to spread knowledge about software engineering best practices. He leads Tech on the Toilet, a weekly one-page newsletter about coding tips that is posted in Google bathrooms worldwide. He also contributes to Google’s unit testing best practices documentation, and is the author of a chapter about unit testing in the Software Engineering at Google book.
Kanu Tewary

Kanu is a technical program manager at Google, with extensive experience in tools and infrastructure. Kanu’s most recent role is in the Office of Cross-Google Engineering, driving the evolution of Google’s infrastructure to best serve the needs of its internal developer community. Kanu volunteers for Tech on the Toilet, a community effort to spread engineering knowledge throughout Google by placing one-page articles in restrooms. Prior to Google, Kanu has had several years of experience as a compiler toolchain engineer at Cisco, and Sun Microsystems. She has taught various university courses, including software engineering for the Cybersecurity Cohort program at San Jose State University. Kanu enjoys mentoring students and early-in-career technologists, and has done so through several organizations including Technovation Challenge, Built By Girls WAVE, and the Grace Hopper Conference.

How Google Uses Bathroom Breaks to Improve Developer Knowledge and Productivity

Andrew Trenk

Kanu Tewary

Take it further with Develocity

The slides

Meet the speakers

Andrew Trenk

Kanu Tewary

Sign up for the DPE Newsletter