ET thoughts: Prediction and the all players all-in poker bug
Submitted by Erik Petersen on Mon, 04/02/2008 - 12:05.
ethics | exploratory testing | perspectives
One of the key aspects of exploratory testing is Prediction. By background research (specialist knowledge, interviewing others or looking at specifications, etc) or by observing software, we understand the models involved and can predict other behavior based on a model or model interactions. While some of this involves predicting positive behaviors, a skilled exploratory tester is often able to leverage failure models to find bugs. Once a bug is found, further investigation may lead to other variations of the bug often with a higher impact.
An example of this occurred recently at an online poker site. Players discovered that in some circumstances, if all players bet all their money, one person won the first prize but all the other players won the second prize amount. After isolating the way to reproduce the bug, groups of players collaborated in much higher stakes games sharing in much bigger jackpots.
While the winnings seem to have peaked in an overnight frenzy , other reports indicate that this was a bug that had been present for several weeks .
While collaborative exploratory testing is normally only profitable in terms of finding bugs, the winning players had their accounts suspended and are facing legal action. Given the poker site has a responsibility to release tested software, it will be interesting to see what happens. All bets are off, literally and figuratively. I don't want to speculate on the outcome. Personally, I'll just be using Prediction in my exploratory testing.
An example of this occurred recently at an online poker site. Players discovered that in some circumstances, if all players bet all their money, one person won the first prize but all the other players won the second prize amount. After isolating the way to reproduce the bug, groups of players collaborated in much higher stakes games sharing in much bigger jackpots.
While the winnings seem to have peaked in an overnight frenzy , other reports indicate that this was a bug that had been present for several weeks .
While collaborative exploratory testing is normally only profitable in terms of finding bugs, the winning players had their accounts suspended and are facing legal action. Given the poker site has a responsibility to release tested software, it will be interesting to see what happens. All bets are off, literally and figuratively. I don't want to speculate on the outcome. Personally, I'll just be using Prediction in my exploratory testing.