THE BOOK OF TESTING

Thoughts From a Braidy Tester

Jim Bullock has been building software for twenty-five years. He has been writing articles and books which engage your mind for almost as long. And I am sure he has been an interesting person for at least as long.

I remember the first time I met Jim in person. I figured we'd talk for an hour or so and then I'd be on my way. Instead, we talked for over four hours. We stopped then only because we each had supper engagements!

One reason Jim and I talked from one meal clear through to the next is that both of us want to understand most everything. Jim has a knack for asking questions which uncover other questions which uncover other questions and so on until he uncovers the root of whatever matter is being discussed. I discovered this helps him be an excellent lunch companion. A plethora of companies have discovered this also helps him move companies from floundering to fabulous.

Jim pays attention to who does what, when. He calls this Conscious Development. I believe he would join me in also calling it fun. Here is what Jim has to say:

Continue reading "Five Questions With Jim Bullock"

Posted by The Braidy Tester at 07:30 AM  Permalink |

Microsoft Test Architect Keith Stobie scales mountains for a living. Currently he is helping Microsoft's Protocol Engineering Team construct model-based tests for Microsoft's wire protocols. A perfect use of model-based testing, you might say; also a project which will take a while to summit. Keith has also worked with the Live Search and Windows Communication Foundation teams, where he undertook similar ventures. He was also an active member of the Web Services Interoperability (WS-I)'s Test Working Group, where he (surprise!) created tools for testing conformance to WS-I profiles. Most all of Keith's work for the last quarter-century, in fact, has involved testing distributed systems.

Keith scales mountains when he's not at work too, albeit ones of a rather more physical nature, like Washington State's Mt. Rainier and Mt. Adams.

Here is what Keith has to say:

Continue reading "Five Questions With Keith Stobie"

Posted by The Braidy Tester at 07:30 AM  Permalink |

Edward Miller isn't the scientist who helped design and develop the Corona reconnaissance satellites. Nor is he the Edward Miller who rode with Jesse James. He is however the founder and CEO of Software Research, Inc., purveyors of web and client/server testing tools. Edward organized the first Florida Software Testing Workshop thirty years ago and has been part of the software testing community ever since. Between publishing articles in IEEE and ACM, organizing the QualityWeek conferences, and building the aforementioned tools, Edward has been supporting testing since before testing was cool.

Here is what Edward has to say:

Continue reading "Five Questions With Edward Miller"

Posted by The Braidy Tester at 07:30 AM  Permalink |

Jason Blue Barile has been testing at Microsoft for some ten years now, working on products such as Internet Explorer and the Windows shell. Before that he lived the college life at Vanderbilt University, where he Research Assisted at the Intelligent Robotics Lab and worked on projects such as a theremin-playing robot. These days find Jason is Test Manager for Microsoft Visual Studio Team Foundation Server down South in North Carolina. I wonder if he's working on a testing robot....

Here is what Jason has to say:

Continue reading "Five Questions With Jason Blue Barile"

Posted by The Braidy Tester at 07:30 AM  Permalink |

Some months ago I posted about CAST 2008, how it's not your typical conference, how gobs of Smart Testers will be attending, and how you probably should attend too.

The program is up now, and it's a doozy! Jerry Weinberg is presenting the opening keynote and also an all-day tutorial on communication and interaction models. Cem Kaner is keynoting about why testing checklists can be helpful even though test scripts often aren't. Michael Bolton, Jonathan Kohl, Scott Barber, and several other testers will explain parallels they see between testing and music, civil engineering, magic, improv, and labor room triage. And there's more!

Check out the program, then head over to the registration page and let them know you'll be attending. (Note: Early Bird registration ends 31 May 2008, so hurry over if you want to save a bit of money.)

Posted by The Braidy Tester at 07:30 AM  Permalink |

Elfriede Dustin has written numerous books and articles about testing and test automation. While I haven't read any of them myself, multiple someones evidently find her books useful as they have been translated into multiple languages and sell worldwide. She co-chairs the annual VERIFY conference, where one of the three presentation tracks focuses on (surprise!) test automation. She got her start in computers doing a different type of automation - using Wang computers to automate claims processing for the United States federal government. These days she is helping the US military automate their software testing, which seems a rather different challenge than the ones on which I work.

Here is what Elfriede has to say:

Continue reading "Five Questions With Elfriede Dustin"

Posted by The Braidy Tester at 07:30 AM  Permalink |

Bob Dewing has been managing testers for as long as I have known him, which means for at least the past ten years. He has been so focused on doing that well that I don't have much else to say about his testing career. So I will have to resort to telling anecdotes from when I worked for him. Well, maybe I shouldn't, because then he will likely turn bright red with embarrassment, like the time he was presenting at an all-hands meeting and his laptop went to screensaver...which his wife had customized to say "I love you Bob!"

There I go, telling stories after I said I wouldn't. I'll stop now and turn you over to Bob.

Here is what Bob has to say:

Continue reading "Five Questions With Bob Dewing"

Posted by The Braidy Tester at 07:30 AM  Permalink |

Paul Carvalho is one of the many Canadians who are actively contributing to the Test community. You may have read his article on internationalization testing for Better Software, his article on hiring testers for Red Canary, or his blog wherein he divulges the secrets of his testing success.

After work Paul's children help him decompress by ensuring he has neither time nor need to focus on any task for more than a few minutes at a time. Once his kids go to bed Paul studies origami and volunteers at Ontario's Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics. And still he finds time to review books and university courses, and to contribute to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge. (Send kudos or complaints, depending on your view of that corpus, to Paul's email above. <g/>)

Here is what Paul has to say:

Continue reading "Five Questions With Paul Carvalho"

Posted by The Braidy Tester at 07:30 AM  Permalink |

How might you know Johanna Rothman? Let me count the ways. She is the author of Hiring the Best Knowledge Workers, Techies & Nerds, which teaches manager types how to find people like you and me and convince us to work for them. She teamed up with Esther Derby on Behind Closed Doors: Secrets of Great Management, which helps manager types manage people like you me - and helps us understand our managers. And most recently she published Manage It! Your Guide to Modern, Pragmatic Project Management, which helps manager types - and people like you and me - keep our projects out of the Business Blow-Ups section of our local newspapers. If blogs are more your style, you can get Hiring Technical People and Managing Product Development that way as well.

Can you tell Johanna runs a management consulting business? <g/> Also why she co-hosts AYE and helps Jerry Weinberg teach PSL?

Johanna follows the Helpful Rule in everything she does, and her books, workshops, and consulting practice all help you understand how to best do the Good Job you want to do. Here is what Johanna has to say:

Continue reading "Five Questions With Johanna Rothman"

Posted by The Braidy Tester at 07:30 AM  Permalink |

Adam White manages Test Engineering and Escalations for PlateSpin. He makes the most of this dual role by using the customer problems he encounters to drive changes in his team's testing process and thus reduce the need for future escalations. As Test Manager part of Adam's job entails engaging his testers in philosophical discussions about testing and living his belief that teaching testing is more about helping people improve their ability to think about software than it is about instructing them in any particular technique or methodology. He also tinkers with neural networks and adaptive systems and such as he experiments with processes for analyzing financial markets and otherwise managing risks of various sorts.

Here is what Adam has to say:

Continue reading "Five Questions With Adam White"

Posted by The Braidy Tester at 07:30 AM  Permalink |