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John McConda's blog

WREST at the Better Software Conference

This year's Workshop on Regulated Software Testing will be hosted free of charge by the Better Software Conference and Expo at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas.

WREST 3 will be held on Friday June 11th, the last day of the conference, with the same LAWST-style format of previous workshops, and will be facilitated by Mike Kelly.

BBST Practical Lessons: False Alarms

After pulling into my garage yesterday I accidentally pressed the panic button on my key fob. My car then proceeded to act like a nervous hysterical person with the lights flashing and horn blaring

WREST 2: We Have a Venue

The Workshop on Regulated Software Testing will be held at DeVry University in
Indianapolis on May 15th. Devry is located on the Northeast side of town and is
within walking distance from the Hyatt Place Indianapolis/Keystone,
Execustay by Marriott, and the Sheraton Indianapolis Hotel and Suites.

We've had some good experience reports come in, but please keep them
coming! If you are intimidated about presenting a full experience
report, please consider a lightning talk instead.

BBST Practical Lessons

The Black Box Software Testing series offered for free to AST members is starting up again, and I’m excited to be a student and volunteer instructor. Developed by Cem Kaner, Rebecca Fiedler, and James Bach, these classes offer university-grade course material in a unique online format.

The most important measure for me when I take part in testing training is how many lessons I can actually use in my daily job. The Foundations course has provided me many of these, a few of which I’d like to share in this and subsequent posts.

Silent Night? Thank a tester.

Twas the night before Christmas and all through the cubes
Not a coder was patching some critical kludge.

The managers nestled all snug in their beds
Had seen the unit tests, all green, no reds.

But not just with machines was this code made pure
Our testers have brains, and they used them for sure.

These sapient lads, and lasses precise
Had trapped critical bugs, with minds like a vise.

US Voting Software: Live User Test Happening Now!

This was my first time using an electronic voting machine. Did anyone else have to fight the urge to test the software instead of just voting?

The First Presidential Testing Debate

What if we elected a President of Testing?

Moderator:
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the campus of Baseline University for the first debate between candidates for the President of Software Testing, I'm your moderator, Quentin Colson, (though sometimes I go by Quentin Anderson just to confuse everyone).

The Test Servant

If testing is a service, what does that make testers?

I’ve heard much about the definition of testing being a service to the project, or at least that this should be the definition of testing, and I agree. Most of this comes from what I’ve heard and read from James Bach and Michael Bolton as part of the Rapid Testing courses.

I’d like to extend this metaphor a step further though. What do you call the person who performs a service? The word service is tossed around so often in the software world that it’s lost a lot of meaning and is easy on the ears. Once the form is changed to “servant” though, you might get some interesting responses. “Me, a servant?”
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