tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.comments2022-02-14T02:28:28.951-05:00Discovered TesterDiscoveredTesterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03855355676637483294noreply@blogger.comBlogger38125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-89004164684851735172022-02-14T02:28:28.951-05:002022-02-14T02:28:28.951-05:00Hi,
I've reached out several times but haven&...Hi,<br /><br />I've reached out several times but haven't heard back, which tells me one of three things:<br />1. You’re interested in giving link back, but haven't had a chance to get back to me yet.<br />2. You're not interested and want me to stop emailing.<br />3. You've fallen and can't get up – in that case let me know and I'll call 911.<br />Can you please reply with 1, 2 or 3? I don't want to be a bother.<br />Happy to pay for your effort<br /><br />==================== Original message =====================<br /><br />Hi<br /><br />I was mining for some data on KEYWORD and was starstuck to your blog http://discoveredtester.blogspot.com/2012/02/weekend-testers-americas-24-black-box.html.<br /><br />Eventually i noticed that you shared http://testing.gershon.info/reporter/.<br /><br />I wanted to let you know that I really enjoy your post. The way you explained every thing made so much sense.<br /><br />However, you missed an article https://www.guru99.com/exploratory-testing-tools.html, i'm sure it will provide a lot of value to your readers.<br /><br />I would be honoured if you link to it.<br /><br />As a thankyou, I would be glad to share your page with our 31k Facebook/Twitter/Linkedin Followers.<br />Or<br />I am happy to do Cross-Promotion.<br /><br />what do you think?<br />Looking forward to hearing your thoughts!<br /><br />Regards,<br />Aesha <br />PS: I am real a person... here is a number to contact me +1 302 308 5151<br />Pranav Ranahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08499965435715298121noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-2962848040127959992015-04-13T12:18:04.352-04:002015-04-13T12:18:04.352-04:00Hi Timothy,
How are you? I came across your blog ...Hi Timothy,<br /><br />How are you? I came across your blog and I was wondering if you would be interested in guest blogging on TESTHuddle.com?<br /><br />In case you are unaware, TEST Huddle is a software testing community that was launched by EuroSTAR Conferences back in early 2014 and there has been steady growth of members ever since. Today we are proud to say that we have over 2500 members and counting.<br /><br />Adding a blog post to TEST Huddle is easy as we have an upload resource option available on the site. You can upload here: http://testhuddle.com/resources/upload-resource/<br /><br />The sooner you upload your blog, the sooner we could add it to the blog schedule.<br /><br />I look forward to hearing from you,<br /><br />Kind regards,<br />Daragh<br />The EuroSTAR Teamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13637777866182347761noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-42548545846498086482013-03-18T07:51:43.153-04:002013-03-18T07:51:43.153-04:00Yes, I'd agree with that, Chris. My intent wi...Yes, I'd agree with that, Chris. My intent with this post, was to expand on the understanding of what the colors really mean. DiscoveredTesterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03855355676637483294noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-16182866524868952022013-03-18T05:47:53.855-04:002013-03-18T05:47:53.855-04:00Agreed. I'll condense this down and generalise...Agreed. I'll condense this down and generalise to "Understand the leaks in your abstractions". If you understand that "green" doesn't equal "works", and "test passed" does not mean "no problems", and "test cases" does not mean "coverage" then you'll avoid a lot of pitfalls.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13113722716216942272noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-51780904992252200782012-07-31T07:07:29.555-04:002012-07-31T07:07:29.555-04:00Those are interesting questions. I'll be hone...Those are interesting questions. I'll be honest that I didn't think quite that deeply about it when I challenged myself here. There is always a trap when you buy a new book. It's easy to start them, it's more difficult, especially with technical tomes to finish them. For me the challenge is to complete the book. Do I have additional goals of what I'd like to get out of it? Yes, I'm hopeful that it will give me a better understanding of ATDD and Acceptance Testing in General. That may seem like a trivial matter to some, but my knowledge of ATDD is limited.<br /><br /><br />Now I mentioned my time constraints as a factor in the challenge only to consider the risks about setting the goal and not attaining it. As I am still kind of in limbo between my new testing gig and my old address I've had little time of late to do these things, yet my mind says to itself, ten pages a day ought to be doable, especially if you know you have a little unstructured time coming in your travel schedule. <br /><br /><br />As for whether the challenge is specifically Markus's book, it didn't have to be Markus's book, but the challenge to read a book to testers, for me is more about reading something to advance your knowledge of software development, or the craft of testing in general. Asking someone to memorize the book seems a bit foolish, so that's not part of it. Markus's book just happened to be the first 'book' I choose to challenge myself with in the last half of 2012.<br /><br /><br />Now, I find these are all interesting questions, because we are always trying to define what does 'done' mean for a particular group of development tasks. For me the end goal is twofold, I'm hoping to finish the book cover to cover. I'm also hoping to find additional benefit that will help me in communicating better with my team. The later is a difficult concept to quantify.<br /><br /><br />Yes there is something of an opportunity cost in choosing this book to challenge myself to read. I have another book I'm hoping to also spend some time in and finish. (That book would be Brian Marick's everyday scripting with Ruby, which I had started in June of last year, but got side tracked when I got thrown back onto a C# team. With Ruby a high possibility of need on my current team I want to finish that book too. Yet I didn't challenge myself on it because I know that tome will take time and I want to digest it slowly.<br /><br /><br />There is a risk here though. Markus's book has to do with ATDD, a quick flip through looked like some SpecFlow/RSpec type definitions that may require time to walk through exercises. If so, then that will indeed complicate the matter. However, I was feeling bold last night to challenge myself and to offer the challenge to anyone else so inclined to take up the Gauntlet. One thing I must warn myself, is I do tend to read fairly fast. Maybe not as fast as the Bach brothers, but technical tomes I tend to not read as quickly.<br /><br /><br />My hope as I continue forward in a new era of learning here is to be able to go back and finish at least one more testing related book which I started, but did not complete because my team context didn't match enough to get good value out of it. (That book would be Lisa Crispin and Janet Gregory's Agile Testing book. My thinking is if I can challenge myself with this smaller tome, that I can then challenge myself to pick that book back up and finish it this time.) <br /><br /><br />Thanks for the comments, and I hope everyone who takes the challenge, doesn't just read to skim it from cover to cover, but really gets something they value out of it. I'm hopeful that ATDD by Example, a Practical Guide will be the kind of book I might read more than once because of its detail. Sorry if this was a bit of a long winded answer, but these are deeper questions which required deep thinking to answer.DiscoveredTesterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03855355676637483294noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-51729995910090045172012-07-31T03:35:46.431-04:002012-07-31T03:35:46.431-04:00Hello Tim,
I think I do not understand the challe...Hello Tim,<br /><br />I think I do not understand the challenge entirely. Is it the purpose to find out if a (any) book of about 200 pages can be read within a period of 15 days (or less), given that only a specific part of the day is reserved for reading?<br />Or is it specifically Markus' book that poses a true challenge because of the extremely difficult subject matter or perhaps a very small font? ;)<br /><br />What should be the result of having read Markus' book? Know the contents word for word? Have a general grasp of what he talks about? Find three ideas that you can start using in practice straight away?<br /><br />If you want to do a qualitative evaluation of this challenge then maybe an important aspect of this challenge is missing. You could for example list the books that you are not going to read in this 15 day period. Or other activities that you'd skip because you're reading a (any) book.<br /><br />Nonetheles, I hope you enjoy reading the book!Jorishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18153135393001613962noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-34412612741864181772012-07-30T21:54:16.069-04:002012-07-30T21:54:16.069-04:00I have my copy and only had a quick flick through ...I have my copy and only had a quick flick through - so I'm up for the challenge !Philhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00281118161548464012noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-91626831591102883072012-04-11T21:20:17.046-04:002012-04-11T21:20:17.046-04:00Those would be fair questions to ask. Presumably ...Those would be fair questions to ask. Presumably if you worked for a company that tunes and optimizes elevators, there might be a reason for it, and that reasoning could potentially shed some light on what is bugging the customer.<br /><br />Some possible answers that could be given, and not all of them may apply in every situation like this.<br /><br />1. Maybe the customer is concerned that it takes him so long to reach his more private suite. (Maybe a direct access to his floor via key would be an easier solution, fix one customer's issue, but wouldn't affect the rest.)<br /><br />2. The customer might say, he notices that people spend a lot of time waiting for the elevators to come back down when they come into the building in the morning, and it seems like it takes forever to wait on them in the evening when everyone is trying to leave at the same time. (this would of course be compounded by an elevator that has to stop on multiple floors). In the case of a large Hospital this might be around the time of the Shift Changes (which are easy to find out), or it could be just an issue where too many people and too few elevators to begin with at peak time.<br /><br />3. In this case I'd presume that most people who would have responsibility to see that Elevator's are in working order, a building owner wouldn't have much knowledge of the elevator's programming per say. Odds are that's why they called you the 'elevator optimization expert.'<br /><br />those are my thoughts anyhows.DiscoveredTesterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03855355676637483294noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-79006218247295276242012-04-02T10:31:50.299-04:002012-04-02T10:31:50.299-04:00Hi Veretax! Very good post and start of discussion...Hi Veretax! Very good post and start of discussion.<br />Here are my questions for elevator owner:<br />1.Are there any customer complaints about elevator usage? What are they?<br />2.Do you have any complaint?<br />3. Do you have any documentation about elevators program?<br /><br />My goal would be to identify the problem about elevator usage.<br /><br />Regards, Karlo.Karlo Smidhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01048765558237756781noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-3090399597884424882012-03-27T21:25:18.912-04:002012-03-27T21:25:18.912-04:00Duncan those are fair and honest questions. I wil...Duncan those are fair and honest questions. I will actually add a bit of an overview, because you're on the right track. Unfortunately my reply was more than could fit into the comments here, so I made a follow up blog post <a href="http://discoveredtester.blogspot.com/2012/03/elevator-optimization-challenge-part-2.html" rel="nofollow">here:</a> to cover it. I hope this part 2 helps answer your questions, but not entirely spoiling the challenge.DiscoveredTesterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03855355676637483294noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-10464337840002580402012-03-27T17:28:37.041-04:002012-03-27T17:28:37.041-04:00Hi Tim, many apologies but I haven't had time ...Hi Tim, many apologies but I haven't had time to tackle this challenge & I'm gonna be swamped in April.<br /><br />1 question I do have though is what options are there for optimising flow as an elevator company? I mean, aren't the elevators constrained by the buildings theyre in & the folks pushing the button to request the elevators?<br /><br />What am I missing please?<br /><br />I'll confess my elevator knowledge isn't brilliant!Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13734686574367515881noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-13129399329799956652012-03-09T17:58:42.651-05:002012-03-09T17:58:42.651-05:00At least a week, maybe two before I put out a foll...At least a week, maybe two before I put out a follow up I think. Potentially longer, so there's time.DiscoveredTesterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03855355676637483294noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-36302754318814368532012-03-09T17:51:48.924-05:002012-03-09T17:51:48.924-05:00Hi tim, nice challenge!
Any deadline for it? Imig...Hi tim, nice challenge!<br /><br />Any deadline for it? Imight get to look at it over the weekend, otherwise it'll be early next weekAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13734686574367515881noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-79078619649371459982012-03-09T07:15:59.048-05:002012-03-09T07:15:59.048-05:00Yeah, I hear you, Scott. I really enjoyed the com...Yeah, I hear you, Scott. I really enjoyed the community aspect of professional societies when I was in the university. But, where I work, aside from people who have 'digital' memberships to certain societies, they aren't exactly involved. It's something I've bumped up against for a while now. A lot of people just don't seem to care. They are happy to have work, and are happy with what I'd call the status quo. <br /><br />I made the decision this year to join AST. I really wanted to join a year or two before, but it took a bit of time to figure out how to get the money out of our budget for it. I value what AST is as a professional society, even if I know I can't make CAST this year in all likelihood. I know Testing in an effect, hasn't been as organized as it probably needs to be, and It's going to take time to get there to be an effective, recognized thing.<br /><br />In anything else, yeah unity sounds really nice, but I somewhat agree with what James Bach said in his response. A tester who insists that there are 'best practices' I'm going to have a hard time agreeing with. It may sound like religion to some, but I definitely agree that the CDT movement isn't just an approach that you choose. It is a fundamental paradigm shift. It isn't something you pick up or put down like the planks of a political platform. In fact, being a CDT has had the affect in non technical areas in my life too. I'm not just a tester who happens to be Context Driven. I am Context Driven in other matters too.<br /><br />Thanks for the discussion Scott. I greatly appreciate it, and I feel we should never fear discussions like this. The more discussion that is had, the stronger the community will be.DiscoveredTesterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03855355676637483294noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-9146240201042256642012-03-09T05:08:36.662-05:002012-03-09T05:08:36.662-05:00See, part of why I see this whole identity thing d...See, part of why I see this whole identity thing differently than some others is because my undergrad degree is also in Engineering (Civil - which makes more sense than it may seem... Performance stuff was easy after 4 semisters of hydro & hydrodynamics... water through pipes, packets over wires... same mental model... In a closed system, the most restrictive "kink in the hose" is the only one that really matters -- until it's removed, etc.)<br /><br />My optimistic side keeps saying "if there were just some sense of unity, or a unified purpose, or an established & respected prof society, or whatever, *then* the school's thing wouldn't be so polarizing... it would be more like a SIG than a scary pirate ship on the horizon threatening to overthrow the un-official, non-government that ain't great, but ain't scary." (Ya' like how I got the Buchaneer-Scholar imagery in there?)<br /><br />My practical side keeps reminding me that I've watched not fewer than 3 attempts to establish a nice, neutral, inviting, not-scary "town hall" (if you will) for TesterLand -- none of which have gotten any real traction... at least not if you look at the number of folks to ever step foot in one of those "town halls" over the number of people who test software for a living as compared to, say, the % of people who work in Electrical Engineering that belong to the IEEE. <br /><br />Wanna know what's *really* sad? I haven't even found a way to bring any kind of core unity to PerformanceTesterVillage, which has *got* to be an order of magnitude or 2 smaller than TesterLand, and there aren't even any good "stay off my land unless you want me to shoot your milkin' cow!" feuds out there. <br /><br />I think it's as much a matter of none of the ones people would feel safe "following" want to lead, and none of the folks willing to "lead" are benign enough to make folks feel safe. <br /><br />I guess it's all a trust thing... "In God we Trust. Everything else we test." Maybe it's not a joke after all. :)Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11678206907629678117noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-73138617892733494202012-03-08T20:20:13.695-05:002012-03-08T20:20:13.695-05:00Excellent comment Scott. I know a lot more has un...Excellent comment Scott. I know a lot more has unfolded in this CDT Discussion since I made these comments. I started on the Engineering side of things. I was a Computer Engineering major and an officer in our Student chapter of the IEEE Computer Society, and the larger club as well. When I got my first professional job though, staying connected to that group didn't last, and there seemed a disconnect for me between the Software issues I was facing and the hardware issues that seemed to be the focused. Finances took a hit early on, and professional society membership dropped on my priority list. <br /><br />At the same time, I noticed all these jobs for QA this and QA that, and wondered at some point, what were those? They weren't talked about in our core paths in the University. As it happened, I got hired as a programmer, not knowing that i'd be asked to do about 70% of my job as testing, and a lot of it acceptance level testing on modules, and a bit less than 30% was programming. At one point I was even working a support desk for about a year. <br /><br />Fast forward to three years ago and I had the interest of getting involved again, and perhaps the finances to do that, but there weren't really nearby chapters, and my professional thinking didn't seem to fit with the typical IEEE thinking anymore. I wasn't a pure Computer Engineer anymore, and I knew it. Then I got the opportunity to become a tester, with a focus on Automation, and that started my journey into testing as a focused career. <br /><br />I totally understand the identity crisis you describe. I'm struggling just the same to find my niche in my current team, where at times it seems even my team leaders can't decide if I'm a tester or a coder. <br /><br />I understand the polarization that Cem Kaner was discussing in his post, and I understand that sometimes that can alienate people we may have a lot more in common with than we might initially see. I still feel there's a place for the school thought though in the CDT School. <br /><br />I think this is important to remember, and that it's important to understand our own tester DNA too. I think the school idea helps me define who I am as an individual, in a way in which I couldn't have described before I came across the idea.<br /><br />Thanks for the reply Scott. The more discussion we have, the better for our community at large, I believe.DiscoveredTesterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03855355676637483294noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-66071147462481548452012-03-08T19:20:00.089-05:002012-03-08T19:20:00.089-05:00A point that I think many miss is that this is not...A point that I think many miss is that this is not just about individual testers.<br /><br />50 years ago (more or less) testING began fighting a rather arduous battle to establish an identity separate from developMENT. This, eventually, led to testERS establishing an identity separate from developERS. <br /><br />TestERS continue to fight battles... battles related to achieving organizational respect, related to gaining the freedom to do good testing, related to not being supplanted by buzz grabbing rhetoric about testERS not being needed in Agile because the testING can be accomplished by develpERS at the unit level & users at the system level.<br /><br />One reason these battles continue is because testING has no unifying community or identity. There is no professional society, there is no educational commonality, there simply isn't any unity. So every time I see the community splinter yet further, I find myself wondering how much longer can the non-unity continue before neither testERS nor testING have a recognized identity, and further wondering what impact that would have on all the individuals in the future who find themselves in a position where they are being asked to test software, but without having any idea where to go to learn.<br /><br />This happens today. There is an organization called the Internation Institute for Business Analysts. About 3 years ago, I was talking to a VP in their org that I ran into at a conference and he said to me, "We've got a bunch of members asking us about software testing, and we don't know what to tell them. Is there a professional society like ours I can point them to?" Of course, I mentioned AST, but the reality is that IIBA is getting these questions about testing because in Financial Services companies *all* testers of software are called Business Analysts... and most of them don't even realize that what they are doing day in and day out is software testing. They don't know there are books & blogs & conferences & training courses, and they don't understand why *the* professional society for Business Analysts doesn't talk about this thing that they spend most of their time doing. The answer, of course, is simple. It's because the Financial Services industry believes that only individual with deep knowledge of financial services are capable of understanding (and thus testing) financial software & they further believe that "If someone is smart enough to understand financial software, they are smart enough to figure out how to tell us if it's working right." <br /><br />Yes, that's a direct quote from a Director who oversees over 100 Business Analysts who's primary task every day is to test software... and when I told him that "tell us if it's working right" is an entire specialty in it's own right called software testing he said...<br /><br />"Really? I thought that was just something people did when told to. You mean people really study that?!?"<br /><br />Draw your own conclusions. Decide that I'm "putting the whole world on the end of a pin." That's fine... maybe you're right. Maybe I am. But I've been watching this closely for a long time & I'm *really* good at identifying patterns in data (I am a performance test guy, after all), and I see a worrisome pattern. That doesn't mean that more time or more data won't change that pattern, but this CDT-School thing is one more data point consistent with the pattern.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11678206907629678117noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-2805576671776989442012-02-18T16:24:31.698-05:002012-02-18T16:24:31.698-05:00The irony here is the inspiration, actually was an...The irony here is the inspiration, actually was an odd sound on a stair case at a church. But it reminded me so much of situations I've encountered in groups before, that I thought it would make a good blog post.<br /><br />Thanks for the comments.DiscoveredTesterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03855355676637483294noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-23121234487378615282012-02-18T10:31:32.263-05:002012-02-18T10:31:32.263-05:00Really good post, excellent story to illustrate yo...Really good post, excellent story to illustrate your message and a great message to share. It can be too easy to fall into ruts, reading posts such as this and blogs from other testers can help keep me thinking so thanks for writing.<br />Lee Copeland has Integrity as one of his 9 Forgettings and I'd like to think that I'd raise the issue rather than be silentPhilhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00281118161548464012noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-2261419584596835752012-02-17T21:57:55.349-05:002012-02-17T21:57:55.349-05:00Good post, Tim. Thought-provoking.Good post, Tim. Thought-provoking.Russ Poolehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05968283081106375900noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-30401183407766423112012-01-18T16:47:21.938-05:002012-01-18T16:47:21.938-05:00Duncan,
Excellent comment. Sorry I just now noti...Duncan,<br /><br />Excellent comment. Sorry I just now noticed it, I've been busy with other things. <br /><br />I totally see your point about Agile, the reality is, I'm not in an Agile Stop. Before my current team, I was on a team that was supposedly looking to go Agile (perhaps SCRUM), but my time on that project ended before I could really get a taste of what that was like. Agile isn't a reality where I'm at now. It certainly could be down the road, but right now, it isn't.<br /><br />Another thing to consider, is that if I choose testing over programming, it isn't like I won't learn anything about programming as I continue down the stream. It also doesn't mean that I couldn't decide to take a detour and go back to focus on programming later down the road. I have used programming to help solve a select group of problems that are testing minded.<br /><br />However there is a difference. I can program, I'm fairly competent at most things I do when I program, but I have self identified as a Tester recently. I'm schooled in Engineering, and perhaps a lot of my vision is framed through that glass, yet I don't consider what I do to be 'engineering work', at least not in the classical sense. Because of that I've always seen programming as something I can do, a skill I have, like orienting a map, or writing a novel, but I have never seen myself strictly as a programmer. <br /><br />The reality is with a family of four, and other events outside of work that already take a great deal of time, there just isn't enough time to divide my time evenly between learning both programming and testing. Today, was the first day in weeks that I've had time to read some other testing blogs. <br /><br />Getting back to my point though. I don't know where I want to go, and it bugs me. I had a five year plan, which didn't work out, so I moved to try and reach that five year plan where I'm at. I reached it, but in the middle my career goals changed a bit, I learned some things I never imagined I'd get to learn, and now that I've hit that goal, I realize I haven't set a goal for the next five or ten years. I want to, I know I need to, but I'm conflicted internally. Perhaps this would be easier if I hadn't seen the team mates I built relationships with these past six years almost all move on, and more still may be on their way. Yet I'm still here. I still have work I can do, but it's different from work in the past. It's something I struggle with more than I have in the past, and this is the crux of the fork metaphor. It feels like I'm swimming upstream, starting to gain momentum, but the stress in going that direction has almost so overwhelmed me of late, that I've lost site of shore in either direction. I've lost my bearings, and thus need to give myself time to reflect and ponder these things.<br /><br />It isn't that I might give up testing, or programming. They've always been a part of what I've done on teams, but I don't feel I can succeed at both simultaneously, at least not where I'm currently planted. <br /><br />So as I try to figure out my own course forward, I'm working at what I can do, providing value where I can, despite feeling like half my brain is reserved as unavailable while doing it at times, yet still achieving results, not quite as efficiently as I'd like, but achieving them none the less. For now I am trying to be content, but I sense on the Horizon a new shift is coming. Sometimes we need to be the change we want, and sometimes we need to move to effect the change we want in ourselves.DiscoveredTesterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03855355676637483294noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-47221857236821608162012-01-03T17:35:25.066-05:002012-01-03T17:35:25.066-05:00Nice post with some great personal reflection &...Nice post with some great personal reflection & critical thinking, but I can't help feeling you're creating a fork where there doesn't necessarily need to be one.<br /><br />In an agile development process, namely with Kanban, there is a lot of hype around the "whole team approach" and members of the team are referred to as "generalizing specialists"<br /><br />We're trying it at my current client and it's great - testers get to help program & programmers get to help test through pairing with each other.<br /><br />To be honest, I still prefer testing, as the programmers like to program, but the border between the two is less black & white.<br /><br />Expanding on Darrens comment, James Bach likened programming (in one particular language) to writing crosswords - each one you write is slightly different from the last, but they're still crosswords. From my limited knowledge, learning the craft of testing appears to have more avenues which are much wider than programming.<br /><br />Good luck in whatever path you choose,<br /><br />DuncanAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13734686574367515881noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-22920209636843349722012-01-02T17:45:41.914-05:002012-01-02T17:45:41.914-05:00Darren,
You are absolutely right about freedom an...Darren,<br /><br />You are absolutely right about freedom and flexibility. They actually not only allow us to do a better job, but for me at least make it more enjoyable as well. I suppose part of my process at present is that I'm in highly 'process driven' environments at present. I feel at times that even when I'm trying to do something that should be somewhat creative, that I'm actually doing it with half my brain forcibly constrained behind me. It is a bit frustrating to be sure.<br /><br />For now though, I'm trying to be content, and focused on determining what my longer term goals may be. If I can get better definition there, then I'll have a better idea of where I want to be long term.DiscoveredTesterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03855355676637483294noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-37568166030756923392012-01-02T17:23:33.102-05:002012-01-02T17:23:33.102-05:00You touched upon how testing has brought back your...You touched upon how testing has brought back your love of learning. I would say for me that is probably the most attractive aspect of a testing role.<br /><br />As testers, test managers, QA people or whatever meaningless title someone cares to place upon us, we tend to be allowed that little bit more freedom than most in IT. I love that about the role, as it gives us a chance to reflect and work out what is most important for us to do our jobs efficiently.<br /><br />I've no doubt whatever happens, things will work out well for you, as they do with most smart, passionate people.Darren McMillanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15372641324627882128noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2726520768982943835.post-36980927436988496492011-12-30T09:54:40.941-05:002011-12-30T09:54:40.941-05:00This post certainly struck a chord with me - curre...This post certainly struck a chord with me - currently working on my 'reflections on 2011' blog post. I've been getting back into learning about coding - Ruby, Rails and now even touching Haskell. I want to understand what the devs around me are doing and talking about - but at the same time the more time I spend learning about languages is less time I spend learning about testing. Trying to find the right balance is going to be one of my 2012 goals, working out what I need to know to be more effectivePhilhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00281118161548464012noreply@blogger.com