Tuesday, July 21, 2009

A brief, unfair, and wrong history of developer-testing in the 21st Century

Step 1 - Be frustrated with the process heavy and skill-free testing done on most projects
Step 2 - View testing as a clerical process to be automated
Step 3 - Ignore the input of the skilled, competent test community about what testing actually is and their experience automating it
Step 4 - Invent TDD and Automated Unit Testing, a Real Good Thing
Step 5 - Extrapolate, by the same logic, that Acceptance Tests should be automated in the same fashion, even for GUIs
Step 6 - Try It
Step 7 - Fail
Step 8 - Repeat steps 6&7 if needed
Step 9 - Realize that some GUI-driving test automation makes sense in some cases, but it is, essentially, checking, not investigating
Step 10 - Ignore the testing community, who have been saying that for ten years
Step 11 - Declare myself an expert. Try to angle for a keynote at Agile 200X.

The steps above are actually a composite of a number of people and ideas. But just maybe enough of an approximation to post ...

2 comments:

  1. "The steps below are actually a composite of a number of people and ideas."

    As are the steps above.

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  2. Anonymous1:59 PM

    Can I be an expert too - oh wait - I can just declare it.

    Except for 4 & 5, this could have happened in the 20th century too.

    Other problem is that sometimes it's hard to find skilled competent testers - or I should say - it's hard to find truly skilled and competent testers among those who claim to be as such.

    Oh - and also - http://blogs.msdn.com/alanpa/archive/2008/09/18/gui-schmooey.aspx

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