Category: Agile

How to write a test strategy

I’ve documented my overall approach to rapid, lightweight test strategy before but thought it might be helpful to post an example.  If you haven’t read the original post above, see that first. This is the a sanitised version of the first I ever did, and while there are some concessions to enterprise concerns, it mostly […]

Read More

Tools for thinking about context – Agile sliders reimagined

Philosophically, I’m aligned to the context-driven testing view of the world. Largely, this is influenced by a very early awareness of contextual factors to success in my first job, and the wild difference between games testing and corporate testing roles that I had. Since 2003, the work of the context-driven school founders has been a […]

Read More

More haiku updates

I’ve added some new ones, need to take one out. At some point, there should probably be a bunch of Scaled Agile haiku. See the agile haiku page.

Read More

Does cucumber suck?

I’ve been having a lot of rants about Cucumber of late, as it’s the new shiny thing for agile teams.  Does anyone else have issues with it?  I’ve asked all of my programmer friends to convince me of its worth, and they’ve all failed so far.  I’ve not seen it adding any value above building […]

Read More

Even more agile Haiku

I’ve added a couple more agile haiku. The essence seems to be getting a bit less essential, so I think at some point a refactoring is going to be in order.

Read More

More agile and software-development Haiku

Time has passed, and I thought it was time to update my thoughts on what’s critical to successful software testing (and development). While originally, I started noting important ideas for agile teams, Increasingly, I find most of these apply no matter what environment I’m working in. Check them out on my Haiku page.

Read More

Test automation models, dehumanising testers and Agile dysfunctions

This tweet was forwarded to me yesterday: martinfowler: Manual scripted testing should be a human rights violation It bothered me on a few levels. Firstly, the simplicity of phrasing around manual and scripted testing. Secondly, that agile developers might view themselves as the saviour of oppressed testers everywhere, and the perpetuation of the concept of […]

Read More

INVESTing in User Stories, revisited

Mike Cohn’s “User Stories Applied” discusses using the INVEST mnemonic as a guide to writing better user stories. I was recently asked to dig up a reference for it, and found this presentation here, with the section on the mnemonic on pages 47 and 48. As I read it, I noticed that there’s been a […]

Read More

Software testing, art and productivity

In the Yahoo software-testing list, Shrini Kulkarni stated “…productvity as a term is “bad” for creative work like “testing” or “art”. That makes me to feel that I am a low skilled labour on a manufacturing assembly line (not that – it is a bad profession but that does not represent the kind of job […]

Read More

Things to look out for in your agile (or Agile) adoption

Jonathan Kohl pointed me at a position paper from Brian Marick for the Agile Coach Camp. If you’re in the middle of adopting agile, it’s well worth a read. You can find it here: http://wiki.agilecoachcamp.org/tiki-index.php?page=BrianMarickPositionPaper

Read More