Had fun answering some questions for the EuroSTAR Conference Community Spotlight…enjoy!
Category Archives: Software Testing
Know Your Role! – Being Invested and the Art of Objectivity
“We absolutely must leave room for doubt or there is no progress and no learning. There is no learning without having to pose a question. And a question requires doubt. People search for certainty. But there is no certainty. People are terrified–how can you live and not know? It is not odd at all. You can think you know, as a matter of fact. And most of your actions are based on incomplete knowledge and you really don’t know what it is all about, or what the purpose of the world is, or know a great deal of other things. It is possible to live and not know.” – Richard Feynman
Recently I gave an interview to Duncan Nisbet from Lets’ Test which ranged in topics from my role at Barclays, the work we are doing with Per Scholas, and my talk on “Testing for Confidence” for EuroSTAR. Thomas Hulvershorn had a great comment and observation on Facebook about the idea of providing information without weighing in on release decisions;
AST CAST 2013 – The good, the bad, and the cheese curds…
My journey to Madison for the Association for Software Testing’s (AST) annual conference (CAST), can be summed up in two words: Paul Holland. Not only was I working with Paul the previous weeks at Per Scholas teaching the STEP class, but he was also the lead facilitator at CAST and little known to me, also my travel buddy. I found out that Paul was travelling on the same flight from NYC to Madison at the same time (7am on Saturday), but better than that, Paul swapped his seats to sit next to me so we could share in our sleep deprived state. Continue reading
Software Testing Training at Per Scholas
It has been an incredible honor and privilege for me to work with Per Scholas as they partner with Barclays to create the Software Testing Education Program (STEP). The outpouring of support from the software testing community has been overwhelming and our partners in this program have been generous beyond my expectations. If you or your company would like to participate in STEP, do not hesitate to contact me and I will be providing updates as the program continues. Thanks – KK Continue reading
Survivorship, Best Practices and The Power of Wish Thinking
“The scientist has a lot of experience with ignorance and doubt and uncertainty, and this experience is of very great importance, I think. When a scientist doesn’t know the answer to a problem, he is ignorant. When he has a hunch as to what the result is, he is uncertain. And when he is pretty damn sure of what the result is going to be, he is in some doubt.” – Richard Feynman
I recently had the distinct privilege of watching an expert tester at work. I wouldn’t call this person a “test manager” or “test lead”, even though what they were doing would probably be categorized as an activity associated with both of those roles. No, I would give them the honor of calling them an expert tester – someone using all of their knowledge and skills developed through years of practicing their craft. And they weren’t even testing software; they were testing ideas. Testing assumptions. Testing people. Testing themselves. It was a thing of beauty. Continue reading
ISTQB Petition Comments
The following are some of the comments I’ve received from the signers of the ISTQB Foundations Exam Review petition. They are obviously biased, but interesting themes are developing. Chris Carter (another training provider) has just been elected president of the ISTQB, so please take a moment to send him an email (chris.carter@istqb.org) to let him know you’d like some answers. Enjoy! Continue reading
Strange Bedfellows
All over the place, from the popular culture to the propaganda system, there is constant pressure to make people feel that they are helpless, that the only role they can have is to ratify decisions and to consume. – Noam Chomsky
Earlier this year, I wrote about the “bizarre public spectacle made up of innuendo, accusations and irony” that the context driven testing website seems to have spiraled into lately. So when I saw the latest missive launched at my questions for the ISTQB, it wasn’t surprising that it was filled with the usual snark (Rabid Software Testing) and name calling (twits). If you can get past the juvenile antics, there are a couple of points that although, mostly irrelevant to the discussion, call for a response.
Certifiable – Fighting the fights worth fighting…
“A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody ought not to be trusted by anybody.” ― Thomas Paine
If you have followed me lately on Twitter, you may have noticed a slight, well let’s say, fervor pursing answers to the questions I posed to the ISTQB. Since publishing that letter a little over a week ago, an important conversation in the software testing community has been reignited over Twitter, LinkedIn, multiple blogs, and loaded up my inbox. And that conversation is NOT about testing certifications or the rackets employed to “regulate”, train, and issue them. Let me be clear, the certification debate is very important, but it is a symptom of a disease in our business: the disease of not owning our value proposition. Continue reading
An open letter to the ISTQB
Date: April, 25 2013
To: ISTQB BOD
Cc: ISTQB Governance Working Group
Subject: Open Letter to the ISTQB
To whom it may concern;
Recently a discussion transpired over Twitter regarding the validity and governance of the Foundation level exam you offer through your training partners. Rex Black, a current board member and past president of the ISTQB, was involved in the exchanges and made the following comments in response to my queries about whether there have there ever been problems with the certifications validity, specifically the reliability coefficient:
Bursting CDT Bubbles
“The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.” – George Bernard Shaw
Conference season has started again, and I’ve made some rounds giving talks at QAI QUEST in Chicago and STAR Canada in Toronto. I had a great time at both talking about problems with bias towards software testing (both positive and negative), and what we and the industry do to support them. But despite all the great conversations I had with colleagues and people I met for the first time, it became clear to me that the context driven community needs to do a better job getting the word out. Continue reading