Machine lockdown purgatory
in Everything, Software Testing
as security lockdown, Testing
Clearly I’ve had it far too easy for the past 10 years. Working for internet-based companies with unfettered access to install whatever I like on my machine, all the internets I could eat, complete control over my testing environment(s). I have a question for all of you who have in the past experienced complete machine [...]
What’s in a word?
in Everything, Software Testing
as educating management about testing, misconceptions about testing, Testing
It’s funny how one word can have multiple meanings. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately in relation to learning Japanese, and especially Japanese grammar where identical grammatical structures can have quite different meanings depending on context. There’s also an English word that’s been bugging me a bit lately. The word ‘just’ can be [...]
So I’m in Japan now
in Everything, Miscellaneous
as Japan, Kendo, Testing
and shall be for the forseeable future. I’m working with an insurance group, putting together a new software testing team. Can’t really say too much more than that. There’s a lot to do, but I have good people with me and I’m up for the challenge. I’m also a lot closer to the bottom of [...]
What’s so great about getting hit with a stick?
in Everything, Kendo
as Kendo, learning kendo
Besides also getting to hit people with a stick? Plenty – eventually. As a beginner in kendo you generally start by learning the body mechanics, repeating the same movements over and over while your teacher continually corrects you on what seems like an endless stream of minutiae. It’s tough at this point – you’re not [...]
Alpha, Beta and gods willing, Omega
Jeff Atwood recently wrote a post about phases of software development/release. He wondered where the terms come from and why we rarely use ‘gamma’ – I wondered if these terms actually have any relevance to what actually goes on in software development anymore. To me, these terms are used to broadly group stages of software [...]
Be a better tester – do something else
If you want to be an extremely effective software tester, I highly recommend you do something else. Really. I’m not talking about being able to complete Halo3 in world-record time. Specifically I mean you should find something that you are passionate about; that takes practice and perseverance to become proficient in, and then master it. [...]
Repetition begets skill…however
In testing, I think there is a tendency to confuse repetition for the purpose of learning with repetition as the application of skill. I have heard that some expound using scripts as a means of skilling up unskilled staff. I believe this thinking is fundamentally flawed. The reason being is that there is no clear [...]
tadaima
So I’m back from CAST. Yes, I know I haven’t finished writing up my notes from the CITCON event. I had every intention of doing so on the trip home, but 30 hours stuck in planes and transit lounges with screaming children, people with questionable personable hygiene and vapid narcissists who need to share with [...]
CITCON Melbourne 2008 – Initial thoughts and impressions
So CITCON is done and dusted. I met a lot of really interesting people, some of them doing some very cool stuff. Saturday turned out to be a long-ish day and quite a fruitful one. I’m going to break down some of the stuff I picked up in the five sessions that I attended in [...]
Tester Advocacy Part 3 – Is productivity a measure of value?
There has been an interesting thread going on in the yahoo software testing group to which I subscribe. The topic began as a discussion about software development as art, but was quickly shoehorned into a discussion about productivity. Jared Quinert blogged a response to this recently which got me thinking again about tester advocacy. I [...]