Much has happened since my last little missive. It seems I've been busy, even by my own standards.
I recently wrapped up assisting with another installment of AST's BBST® (yeah, its now a registered trademark of Kaner Fiedler & Associates LLC) Foundations course. There were a PILE of students in this instance. Like many times, there were some students who were really well prepared and willing to dive into the exercises, and there were some who were less prepared. Or maybe less willing to participate. Either way, the results were the same. The result was some did really well, some had a harder time.
Oh. I also wrote two presentations, facilitated a local tester meeting, presented one of the presentations at the local tester meeting and dealt with a whole stack of goodies at house stuff and garden stuff and life stuff. Garden stuff? Yeah. Its August - now September. We have more tomatoes and peppers and ... stuff coming in from the garden than I can remember seeing. Oh. Potatoes. We'll be harvesting them soon. It is crazy how much stuff we have coming in. And general tending and watering and keeping the lawn mowed and all the normal family/household activities.
I'm also getting ready for a really, REALLY busy couple of months. In October, I'll be attending and participating at PNSQC in Portland, Oregon. I'll be hanging out with some cool folks and learning an sharing there. And then, just as I'm about In November, I'll be at Agile Testing Days in Potsdam, Germany.
In the midst of this, I resigned my position with the
company I worked for. I became an independent consultant. I entered
into a contract with a local company that was looking for a little
help. With this, one has all the joys of starting a new job (no matter
how cool or how much fun the gig is, there is still a moderate amount of
strain) and starting a new business while trying to keep your feet on
the ground. Oh yeah!
So, when the paperwork is finalized, I'll be excitedly announcing a new business name. It seems I've been so busy that I'm still fumbling my way through the various legal documents. Can't imagine what I've been doing that has gotten in the way.
So, yes. A third installment on User Experience and Testers is in the works. It will be out shortly. I also have some notes I am trying to pull together to make another couple of articles that are still a bit cloudy. So, there is more stuff coming.
Thanks for reading.
Showing posts with label BBST. Show all posts
Showing posts with label BBST. Show all posts
Thursday, September 20, 2012
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
On Learning and Learning and, well, Learning
The last few weeks I have had the honour of being an assistant instructor for the current Foundations course in the AST's Black Box Software Testing (BBST) course.
Going in, I was a little nervous. Partly, I think, because I had agreed to be a "contingency instructor" for the course. That is, should one of the other instructors not be able to, well, instruct, I'd step in. Well, that happened. On top of that, the day-job is going nuts and I'm way behind on other writing (which is why I'm taking a minute to write a quick blog entry - don't tell anyone.)
Oh, I have presentations and a paper to prepare and.. well, never mind.
Some 20+ students dove in, and the instructors dove in with them. And the fun began. Really.
Exercises and reading and lectures and learning and group exercises and... thinking. Lots of thinking. And learning. When I took the course it was like trying to take a drink from a fire hydrant. Massive amounts of information and ideas and, well, huge learning.
You know what I've learned as an instructor? Lots. Huge learning. Massive amounts. I half expected this from teaching drumming and drumming workshops, but, whoa.
So, we are about to start the final lesson, then the exam. hooo-boy.
What have I learned most? If you want to really learn something, try explaining it to someone else.
Going in, I was a little nervous. Partly, I think, because I had agreed to be a "contingency instructor" for the course. That is, should one of the other instructors not be able to, well, instruct, I'd step in. Well, that happened. On top of that, the day-job is going nuts and I'm way behind on other writing (which is why I'm taking a minute to write a quick blog entry - don't tell anyone.)
Oh, I have presentations and a paper to prepare and.. well, never mind.
Some 20+ students dove in, and the instructors dove in with them. And the fun began. Really.
Exercises and reading and lectures and learning and group exercises and... thinking. Lots of thinking. And learning. When I took the course it was like trying to take a drink from a fire hydrant. Massive amounts of information and ideas and, well, huge learning.
You know what I've learned as an instructor? Lots. Huge learning. Massive amounts. I half expected this from teaching drumming and drumming workshops, but, whoa.
So, we are about to start the final lesson, then the exam. hooo-boy.
What have I learned most? If you want to really learn something, try explaining it to someone else.
Friday, December 30, 2011
Janus Part 1: Looking Back 2011
One of the benefits of taking four years of Latin is that you pick up all kinds of interesting things that many other folks may miss. Then again, an awful lot of people don't worry too much that "i.e." is an abbreviation of "id est" or, "that is". Just like "etc." is an abbreviation of "et cetera" - even though they may even SAY et cetera, I wonder how many know what it means? I'm mean enough to not say here, and say "look it up" - unless you remember your Latin as well.
Janus, for whom the month of January is named, looked both forward and back. That is a bit of what I want to do with this post and the next. The post I wrote last night was a precursor to these couple of posts, partly because the things described yesterday laid the foundation for this past year and the year to come.
What I wrote January 1, 2011:
It was not a bold move to make such a prediction - I simply knew there was a likelihood that I'd be looking for work. When one company assimilates, well, acquires, another company, "long term employment" prospects for the staff of the acquired company are not terribly high.
As it was, I was not let go. I was retained. One colleague resigned after accepting a new position. His last day, we had a farewell luncheon for him. By the end of the next day, myself and another tester were all that remained of our team. One other person, a developer, had been transferred from the development staff to testing. although others on the team
We are continuing, and moving forward.
I expect this to continue and grow in the coming year. That would be way cool.
The GR Testers, the local testing group, is up and running strong. The group has met monthly since that January post. I've made it to most of the meetings. The ones I missed, I was out of town, usually at a conference. Cool.
Conferences. I presented at STPCon (Spring) in Nashville. I gave a joint presentation with my (then) boss, Kristin Dukic, as well as a presentation and lightning talk on my own. I then was flattered, and honored, to attend and participate in CAST. With Matt Heusser, I helped organize the Emerging Topics track, where a self-organized group selected topics submitted via a wiki - then ran for 20 minutes, every 25 minutes. It was astounding.
After CAST, I had the opportunity to present at STPCon Fall in Dallas. Matt Heusser and I did a day-long workshop (excerpts are on the Software Test Professionals site, under Podcasts) - then a joint track session on "Complete Testing". THAT was a lot of fun. I also presented a track session on my own as well as a lightning talk. Matt just gave a keynote.
Then since I was not busy enough, I presented at TesTrek in Toronto in November.
Whew.
Other Stuff
Scads of people have encouraged me this year. Among them, Matt Heusser, who put me in contact with the folks at TechTarget, and made the case that he could not do Emerging Topics at CAST on his own - which is how I got in. Cool, heh? THEN - Matt had so much fun with that, he asked if I'd be interested in doing a joint workshop in Dallas. Oh yeah. The interesting thing is that he's really a nice guy - as the folks who know him will attest.
Also - Fiona Charles is supportive and encouraging. She is really an amazing person who is willing to offer suggestions and ideas on how to improve articles, presentations, whatever. She also is way cool. She was one of the very first people that I consider a "Name" in testing, to ask for comments on a paper - the list me in the acknowledgements. Humbling.
Catherine Powell whom I met in person at STPCon in Nashville always has encouragement and good suggestions. Michael Larson is a great guy. He's got a great outlook on life and testing. His blog is inspiring. Doug Hoffman was the Head Instructor for the BBST Foundations course. What a smart guy. Nice as the day is long. We had several very nice chats both at CAST or at STPCon Fall. If you get a chance to see him present - DO. Cem Kaner - yes DOCTOR Kaner - the drive behind the BBST Courses. An ongoing inspiration.
There are more - Michael Bolton, Lynn McKee, Griffin Jones, Nancy Kelln, and many more. These are the people I look to for inspiration and mental reinvigoration.
And of course, my lady-wife, Connie.
I do not know what the future will bring. I will discuss what I hope for the future in the next post.
Janus, for whom the month of January is named, looked both forward and back. That is a bit of what I want to do with this post and the next. The post I wrote last night was a precursor to these couple of posts, partly because the things described yesterday laid the foundation for this past year and the year to come.
What I wrote January 1, 2011:
The Road Ahead...A bunch of folks commented privately, "Dude, pretty gutsy to say you'll be looking for work when you're still employed." What I could not say then, was that in December, the entire staff of the company I worked for was told, in essence, that the company leadership was negotiating the sale of the company. We did not know to which other company, nor what the terms would be. Many of us speculated that the only reason we were told at that point, was because they needed us to sign releases of our stock options in case the sale closed before the end of the year.
The interesting thing is I've been thinking about the future. Well, not THE future, but what lay ahead for me professionally and how that may impact the family. It would seem there are several items that are possibilities for the coming year. One path would be to look for new work opportunities, either as a contract/consultant or as a full time, permanent employee. Yeah, as if "permanent" means much.
It was not a bold move to make such a prediction - I simply knew there was a likelihood that I'd be looking for work. When one company assimilates, well, acquires, another company, "long term employment" prospects for the staff of the acquired company are not terribly high.
As it was, I was not let go. I was retained. One colleague resigned after accepting a new position. His last day, we had a farewell luncheon for him. By the end of the next day, myself and another tester were all that remained of our team. One other person, a developer, had been transferred from the development staff to testing. although others on the team
We are continuing, and moving forward.
CommunityThis continues. I've been writing. Alot. STP Magazine and TechTarget's SearchSoftwareQuality both have run articles I've written. my more in my blog, and more engaged in forums than ever before.
Another option is to become more involved in the testing community. Actually, I started working on that as well in 2010. What I mean is that reading blogs other folks write is a good way to learn what they're thinking is. Reading and participating in on-line forums is another way to both learn and become involved. Well, doing that as much as I can right now.
Of course, more actively engaging in both of these types of activities is on my list of things to do this coming year. Ya know, the funny thing is, the more I talk with folks about things I learn and have learned, the more I learn myself.
I expect this to continue and grow in the coming year. That would be way cool.
Local Testing Groups
Another thing, the local testing group, GR Testers, has been going in fits and starts for a while. Meetings have been sparse of late. The most recent one, December, was kind of fun. There were a bunch of us sitting around a table, lots of wings, good beer and folks talking about testing. Good way to spend an evening. There's another meeting coming up Monday, 3 January. It makes it the first time in quite a while that there were back to back monthly meetings. Normally, they are officially held every other month. It seems that as more people are showing an interest, the meeting frequency will pick up.
I wonder how many other local testing groups are out there that have a meeting schedule based on "whenever" instead of "We meet at this time, and here are the next couple of topics we're focusing on at these meetings..." I believe that the more people know about local groups, the more they are invited to participate and the more information that is available about them, the more active and the stonger the community there is.
I think that pretty well sums up what I'm looking to do with the local group. I believe that getting more people involved and talking about testing is vital to improving not only our individual tradecraft, but the abilities of the local community. Sharing well reasoned ideas can do nothing but good, presuming all are allowed to learn and ask questions
The GR Testers, the local testing group, is up and running strong. The group has met monthly since that January post. I've made it to most of the meetings. The ones I missed, I was out of town, usually at a conference. Cool.
Personal DevelopmentThis happened beyond my wildest dreams. I took and passed the BBST Foundations course. Then, even though the schedule did not permit me to take the Bug Advocacy course - that is on the list for next year for me. I also took the Instructor's Course from AST. We'll see how the schedule works out this coming year.
Now, I realize that any of the above activities can lead to improving any individual participating. What I mean here is something a bit more. I had been signed up for the BBST Foundations course offered by the Association for Software Testing for a session in in the fall of 2010. Things happened and that session was cancelled. I could not take the session offered as an alternative.
The GOOD news, for me, is I am signed up to take the Foundations course this spring. YEAH! I am really looking forward to this. Everyone I know who took the course raves about it. Big-time excited.
I've continued reading blogs and articles and books and talking with people and... everything else. My goal is to continue learning and to continue to share what I learn.
For conferences, I'll be attending and presenting at STPCon in March in Nashville. I bought myself a birthday present and renewed my AST membership in October. If I can work it out, I'll be attending CAST in August in Seatle.
Conferences. I presented at STPCon (Spring) in Nashville. I gave a joint presentation with my (then) boss, Kristin Dukic, as well as a presentation and lightning talk on my own. I then was flattered, and honored, to attend and participate in CAST. With Matt Heusser, I helped organize the Emerging Topics track, where a self-organized group selected topics submitted via a wiki - then ran for 20 minutes, every 25 minutes. It was astounding.
After CAST, I had the opportunity to present at STPCon Fall in Dallas. Matt Heusser and I did a day-long workshop (excerpts are on the Software Test Professionals site, under Podcasts) - then a joint track session on "Complete Testing". THAT was a lot of fun. I also presented a track session on my own as well as a lightning talk. Matt just gave a keynote.
Then since I was not busy enough, I presented at TesTrek in Toronto in November.
Whew.
Other Stuff
Scads of people have encouraged me this year. Among them, Matt Heusser, who put me in contact with the folks at TechTarget, and made the case that he could not do Emerging Topics at CAST on his own - which is how I got in. Cool, heh? THEN - Matt had so much fun with that, he asked if I'd be interested in doing a joint workshop in Dallas. Oh yeah. The interesting thing is that he's really a nice guy - as the folks who know him will attest.
Also - Fiona Charles is supportive and encouraging. She is really an amazing person who is willing to offer suggestions and ideas on how to improve articles, presentations, whatever. She also is way cool. She was one of the very first people that I consider a "Name" in testing, to ask for comments on a paper - the list me in the acknowledgements. Humbling.
Catherine Powell whom I met in person at STPCon in Nashville always has encouragement and good suggestions. Michael Larson is a great guy. He's got a great outlook on life and testing. His blog is inspiring. Doug Hoffman was the Head Instructor for the BBST Foundations course. What a smart guy. Nice as the day is long. We had several very nice chats both at CAST or at STPCon Fall. If you get a chance to see him present - DO. Cem Kaner - yes DOCTOR Kaner - the drive behind the BBST Courses. An ongoing inspiration.
There are more - Michael Bolton, Lynn McKee, Griffin Jones, Nancy Kelln, and many more. These are the people I look to for inspiration and mental reinvigoration.
And of course, my lady-wife, Connie.
I do not know what the future will bring. I will discuss what I hope for the future in the next post.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
On Drumming and Learning and Testing
I really don't have time to be writing this blog entry. I should be working on the exam study guide for the Black Box Software Testing (BBST) course I'm taking through the Association for Software Testing (AST.) If not that, I should be finishing answers submitted some time ago to Ask the Tester through STP. I'm getting there, but a couple of the answers I wrote I'm not really satisfied with. I also should be polishing the slides for the presentations I'm doing at STPCon next month. ALMOST done, is not DONE. Right?
I needed to come up for air after having a bit of a break in my schedule though.
One of the commitments I have that is fairly long-standing is teaching drumming. Since July, I've been working with a group of absolute novice drummers with a pipe band on the East side of Michigan - about two hours from my home. So, we got together once each month in July, August and September, then twice a month since then. We met on Saturday afternoons for four hours.
The youngest student is eight years old, the oldest is in his late 30's. The goal was to teach them enough where they could play with their band. Two students had some drumming experience outside of the world of bagpipe bands: one is a middle-school student learning drums through school; the other is his dad. Dad had some drumming but no formal training. The lesson in July consisted of "This is a drumstick. This is how you hold a drumstick."
The first week of December, one of the students made a comment that he felt like they were doing a lot of exercises but bot really getting what they needed to actually play with a band. I asked what he meant. He said "We do all this stuff, I'm learning a lot but I'm not sure how it applies to me playing in the pipe band." My response was "You all are closer than you think. There is no reason why at least two of you will not be able to play with the band at the band's ceilidh (a party/celebration - lots of music and dancing and bagpipes) in February. Everyone else will be able to play with the band by May." They looked at me in complete disbelief.
The next lesson, shortly before Christmas, I passed out a new exercise, a full sheet of music. I told them, "This is a drum salute that you will all be playing in February. All of you can play everything on this page."
Their performance was last night. My lady-wfie and I, grandson as well, drove across the State to go to the band's ceilidh, which is their biggest fundraising event of the year. The place was packed - hundreds of people in a hall. A short introduction and the drumming students came out first - before the full band. Then they played. They did really well. I was terribly proud of them and what they had done.
When they finished as a group, the pipers marched into the hall and joined them. The students who were not quite ready stepped back and moved off stage while the other drummers played the rest of the performance. At the end of the night, this band came out again along with the two guest pipe bands and played together. Some of the stiudents went out to play with the other bands, some did not feel comfortable doing that. No worries. No pressure. The idea was to have fun.
All of them are reinvogorated. The most consistent comment I heard from them was how much fun they had playing. Even the ever-so-cool teenage boy smiled and said that was a lot more fun than his school stuff.
So, after driving back across the State this morning (hoping to beat the nasty weather predicted) I was thinking about the drumming students experience and my own with BBST. Part of the opening lecture was about reading carefully. I muffed two questions on the last quiz and one on the one before because I did NOT read carefully enough.
In working on answers to the essay questions in the exam study guide, I find myself challenging my own statements, thinking hard about the answers and running through them in my mind. I am finding myself more challenged than I have in some time to look at how I think about things, testing in particular.
In the current project at work (yeah, I'm trying to keep up with that as well) I find myself thinking about concepts I've just read or re-read from the course. (If the boss thinks I was passionate about how testing can be better at the company before this course, look out!)
It IS more work than I expected. I knew it was going to be a lot of work; it is simply more than I thought it would be. At the same time, I'm also having fun learning and stretching how I think about things. That is very rewarding in itself. So, yeah, like the drumming students, I'm having fun.
Oh. I forgot to mention that STPStanley came along with us. We took a lot of pictures and will be posting some of them shortly.
I needed to come up for air after having a bit of a break in my schedule though.
One of the commitments I have that is fairly long-standing is teaching drumming. Since July, I've been working with a group of absolute novice drummers with a pipe band on the East side of Michigan - about two hours from my home. So, we got together once each month in July, August and September, then twice a month since then. We met on Saturday afternoons for four hours.
The youngest student is eight years old, the oldest is in his late 30's. The goal was to teach them enough where they could play with their band. Two students had some drumming experience outside of the world of bagpipe bands: one is a middle-school student learning drums through school; the other is his dad. Dad had some drumming but no formal training. The lesson in July consisted of "This is a drumstick. This is how you hold a drumstick."
The first week of December, one of the students made a comment that he felt like they were doing a lot of exercises but bot really getting what they needed to actually play with a band. I asked what he meant. He said "We do all this stuff, I'm learning a lot but I'm not sure how it applies to me playing in the pipe band." My response was "You all are closer than you think. There is no reason why at least two of you will not be able to play with the band at the band's ceilidh (a party/celebration - lots of music and dancing and bagpipes) in February. Everyone else will be able to play with the band by May." They looked at me in complete disbelief.
The next lesson, shortly before Christmas, I passed out a new exercise, a full sheet of music. I told them, "This is a drum salute that you will all be playing in February. All of you can play everything on this page."
Their performance was last night. My lady-wfie and I, grandson as well, drove across the State to go to the band's ceilidh, which is their biggest fundraising event of the year. The place was packed - hundreds of people in a hall. A short introduction and the drumming students came out first - before the full band. Then they played. They did really well. I was terribly proud of them and what they had done.
When they finished as a group, the pipers marched into the hall and joined them. The students who were not quite ready stepped back and moved off stage while the other drummers played the rest of the performance. At the end of the night, this band came out again along with the two guest pipe bands and played together. Some of the stiudents went out to play with the other bands, some did not feel comfortable doing that. No worries. No pressure. The idea was to have fun.
All of them are reinvogorated. The most consistent comment I heard from them was how much fun they had playing. Even the ever-so-cool teenage boy smiled and said that was a lot more fun than his school stuff.
So, after driving back across the State this morning (hoping to beat the nasty weather predicted) I was thinking about the drumming students experience and my own with BBST. Part of the opening lecture was about reading carefully. I muffed two questions on the last quiz and one on the one before because I did NOT read carefully enough.
In working on answers to the essay questions in the exam study guide, I find myself challenging my own statements, thinking hard about the answers and running through them in my mind. I am finding myself more challenged than I have in some time to look at how I think about things, testing in particular.
In the current project at work (yeah, I'm trying to keep up with that as well) I find myself thinking about concepts I've just read or re-read from the course. (If the boss thinks I was passionate about how testing can be better at the company before this course, look out!)
It IS more work than I expected. I knew it was going to be a lot of work; it is simply more than I thought it would be. At the same time, I'm also having fun learning and stretching how I think about things. That is very rewarding in itself. So, yeah, like the drumming students, I'm having fun.
Oh. I forgot to mention that STPStanley came along with us. We took a lot of pictures and will be posting some of them shortly.
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