Events

WATCH: Alex’s introduction to the talk

It’s fair to say that our team isn’t a typical agile team. We’re a young team in terms of age/experience, but old in terms of existence. We have had quite a lot of changes through the years, including frequent people-swaps. We often deal with totally new technologies and unknown areas, have a flow of external members that come and go, and always wish that we had more time and resources to test.

Actually, no team is probably ever typical – so the likelihood you’ll recognize one of your own idiosyncrasies in that list is large. This talk is about our QA “cookbook”: the recipes we have devised to deal with the “normal” challenges of project work, and the ingredients we have tried to deal with our differences and idiosyncrasies.

Over the course of the talk, I’ll present our recipes such as “Continuous Integration Cake” with “Reacting to Test Results Jam”. We’ll taste “OMG a Release Bolognese” with a side of “Big Bang and Mash”. No meal is complete without “Story Planning Soup” or “Bug Bouillabaisse”. To top it all off, we’ll eat “Test Automation Pie” and “Done-Doc-Test Trifle”.

For each recipe, we’ll look at things like when it’s good to eat, the ingredients required for it and our various refinements to get it to its current version. Many things may not quite be the standard steps, checklists and tastes, but we’re a pragmatic team who spice things to deal with our own needs and requirements. Maybe you’ll find something that you want to cook at home.

Of course, even we have to admit that our recipes don’t always work. That’s when we have to order bad-tasting pizza instead of tasty home-cooked food. I’ll discuss some times and areas where we still have to call the pizza company.

• T6 - QA Cookbook: Ingredients for a Great Recipe - Alexandra Schadebeck

  16:00 (Tuesday) Liffey Hall 2, Level 1