I’ve just had to buy a new computer, and am now becoming intimate with Windows Vista. “Becoming intimate” is a euphemism that people sometimes use when they mean “being screwed”. The biggest problem I’ve encountered so far is with Vista’s User Interface Feature Concealment module, which took the few remaining things that were reasonably intuitive and accessible in Windows XP and hid them. Joel Spolsky, he of Joel on Software, … Read more
Much of what I’ve reported about EuroSTAR has been on the topic that had the most energy around it–the very gratifying response to my keynote presentation. I’d be remiss in not mentioning some other highlights. A tip of the hat to Tracy O’Connell and the friendly, helpful, and capable staff of EuroSTAR 2007. The entire conference went off splendidly. Henrik Andersson, a member of the context-driven community and a real … Read more
EuroSTAR has been a wonderful conference for me. Alas, I’ve been unable to attend many of the track presentations because I’ve been, well, conferring. I’ve had some very engaging and interesting chats, and it’s been great to connect familiar names with their faces. I look forward to many more visits to Europe. Today’s activities included a conversation, sometimes quite animated, with Stuart Reid. I’ve been surprised at the strength of … Read more
Today, December 4 2007, I gave a presentation at EuroSTAR on “Why I Am Not (Yet) Certified“. James Bach was originally slated to give a different presentation with the same title, but I got the nod due to the untimely illness of James’ wife Lenore, which caused him to cancel his fall schedule (she’s much better now). Stuart Reid, the chair of the conference, strongly supports the notion of certifications … Read more
For those who read my blog but don’t read Grig Georghiu‘s, he notes an interview with Jerry Weinberg here. Thanks, Grig.
One of the problems in our business is that people are usually reluctant to talk about testing, even when it’s successful. In order to discuss testing, they may have to cop to problems in their product, or in their development work. Even if they’re very happy with the things that they’ve learned in the course and put into practice, they may have to acknowledge that earlier forms of testing were … Read more
I wrote a paper on pairwise testing in 2004 (and earlier), and now, in 2007, it’s time for an update. This post is an edited version of an appendix that I’ve recently added to that paper. First, there appears to be great confusion in the world between orthogonal arrays and pairwise testing. People use the terms interchangeably, but there is a clear and significant difference. I’m fairly proud of the … Read more
In an ongoing effort to spend even more time on the Web, I am adding a Technorati profile.
I’m going to be at the STARWest conference on the evening of Wednesday, October 24 through the morning of Friday, October 26. On Thursday morning, I’ll be presenting a talk on Emotions and Test Oracles, an expansion of a lightning talk that I gave at STAR East in May. Alas, my colleague James Bach is unable to be there. His subject, “How to Fake a Test Project” will be covered … Read more
Pradeep Soundararajan is a colleague of me and of James Bach. Pradeep would say he’s a student, but in this case the student has surpassed this teacher. Pradeep writes and tests and thinks with passion. In a recent blog post, he came up with this gem: “…it is not a test that finds a bug but it is a human that finds a bug and a test plays a role … Read more