I gave a talk at a meetup hosted by GoDaddy last Friday. I had a good time, and the comments afterwards were positive. More than one of the folks I talked with after the event asked why I don’t blog anymore. I have been a bit sparse in my blogging over the last few years,…
I feel like today’s a good day to share a few stories about my first few months at Microsoft, and the (very) small part I played in shipping Windows 95. My start at Microsoft is a story on its own, and probably worth recapping here in an abbreviated form. I started at Microsoft in January…
Readers of my blog know my stance on UI automation. But, as I’ve forgotten my StickyMinds password, and the answer is longer than 140 characters, so I’m responding here. This article from Justin Rohrman talks about the coolness of Selenium for UI testing. In a paragraph called, “Why the UI”, Justin wrote: The API and…
It’s been a long time since I have had to talk so much, but I had a great time, and met some great people. As promised (to many people in my talks), here are the links to my presentations. My Tutorial My Keynote My Track Session
I mentioned in my last post that I have a new job at Microsoft (and I discussed it a bit more on the last AB Testing). During the interviews for the job, I talked a lot about quality. I used the agile quadrants as one example of how a team builds quality software (including my…
In January of 1995, I began some contract work (testing networking) on the Windows 95 team at Microsoft. Apparently, my work was appreciated, because in late May, I was offered a full time position on the team. My first official day as a full time Microsoft employee was June 5, 1995. That was twenty years…
Whaaa…? Two posts on automation in one week? Normally, I’d refrain, but for those who missed it on twitter, I recorded an interview with Fog Creek last week on the Abuse and Misuse of Test Automation. It’s short and sweet (and that includes my umms and awws).
I think this is the first time I’ve blogged about automation since writing…or, to be fair, compiling The A Word. But yet again, I see questions among testers about the value of automation and whether it will replace testers, etc.. For example, this post from Josh Grant asks whether there are similarities between automated trucking…
What a year it’s been so far. I’ve been away from blogging, and I’m not quite sure if I’m back yet, but I expect so…and here’s why. The project I’m working on at Microsoft is no longer a secret. I’ve never blogged a lot about product specifics, but since a big chunk of my work…
A while back (no link cause I’m lazy), I mentioned that one thing (among many) missing from How We Test SW at MS was a bibliography of testing books. While we didn’t refer directly to any books when writing the book, the influence of several testing books is definitely there, and worth noting for those…
Warning, non-software post follows. 2014 was an interesting year for me. The year began with the trailing two weeks of a four week visit to Australia. Then, I spent July and August in France, then took another week off when I returned to take care of my dad. Finally, I took the last two weeks…
I took some time recently to answer some questions about Combined Engineering, Data-Driven Quality, and the Future of Testing for the folks at the A1QA blog. Check it out here.
We’re less than a week away from the sixth anniversary of How We Test Software at Microsoft (some chapters were completed nearly seven years ago). Recently I was considering a new position at Microsoft, and one of my interviewers (a dev architect and also an author) said that he had been reading my book. I…
My last post dove into the world of engineering teams / combined engineering / fancy-name-of-the-moment where there are no separate disciplines for development and test. I think there are advantages to one-team engineering, but that doesn’t mean that your team needs to change. First things First I’ve mentioned this before, but it’s worth saying again….
I talk a lot (and write a bit) about software teams without separate disciplines for developers and testers (sometimes called “combined engineering” within the walls of MS – a term I find annoying and misleading – details below). For a lot of people, the concept of making software with a single team falls into the…
I recently ran across this article on nytimes.com from over a year ago. Here’s the punch line (or at least one of them): “We looked at tens of thousands of interviews, and everyone who had done the interviews and what they scored the candidate, and how that person ultimately performed in their job. We found…
I’m back home and back at work…and slowly getting used to both. It was by far the best (and longest) vacation I’ve had (or will probably ever have). While it’s good to be home, it’s a bit weird getting used to working again after so much time off (just over 8 weeks in total). But…
I mentioned this on twitter a few times, but should probably mention it here for completeness. I’m taking a break. I’m taking a break from blogging, twitter, and most of all, my day job. Beyond July 4, 2014, I’ll be absent from the Microsoft campus for a few months– and most likely from social media…
In case you missed it, Brent and I are still recording testing podcasts. I stopped posting the announcements for every podcast post on this blog, but if you want to subscribe, you have a few choices. You can Subscribe via RSS You can Subscribe via iTunes You can bookmark the podcast blog You can follow…
Well – that was a fun post. The dust hasn’t quite settled, but a follow up is definitely in order. First, some context. I was committed to giving a lightning talk as part of STAR East’s “Lightning Strikes the Keynotes” hour. I purposely didn’t pick a topic before I left, and figured I would come…