Weekly Newsletter: Learn about different types of APIs
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TESTING AND THE COMMUNITY
The Sessions of Fall OnlineTestConf You Won’t Want to Miss
The 5th OnlineTestConf (November 27–28th) is on its way. The sessions, lead by great speakers, will tackle the most debated topics on everyone’s minds. Attendance is free but the knowledge shared will be priceless. Save your seat!
TestBash Brighton 2019 3rd — 5th April
So you’ve seen the excitement from TestBash San Francisco. You likely felt the pangs of missing out on so many phenomenal talks from the diverse range of speakers. Thankfully you can now book your ticket to TestBash Brighton, save some money and start getting excited!
Free Webcast: Empowering Continuous Testing through Behavior-Driven Development
Listen in as we discuss how BDD reduces ambiguity and helps ensure a product will satisfy the customer’s business requirements with an acceptable level of business risk upon release.
Learn about different types of APIs, share your findings by Kanwar
As part of the 30 Days of API Testing challenge, we want you to share the knowledge you’ve gain from research and experience on the different types of APIs. #30DaysofTesting
No REST for women by Anne-Marie Charrett
There’s plenty of pages giving you links to API Software Testing. Right now in MoT 30 days API Testing Challenge, they are working on collating lots of these which is a great idea. I wanted to contribute using a different approach.
New Generation of Selenium IDE with creator Simon Stewart
Don’t miss this session on 14th Nov at 6pm with Simon Stewart. Simon will unveil the new selenium IDE, sharing the capabilities, features, and future roadmap.
TestBash San Francisco Live Blog by Michael
Michael brought us a number of live entries from day one of TestBash San Francisco. Gain insight into the talks given and Michael’s thoughts.
Lean Testing by Aaron Hodder
There are many different definitions of software testing, and many views on what responsible testing looks like in our industry. How you view the role of a tester informs what practices and artifacts you believe are valuable.
A False Dichotomy of Modern Testing by Jeff Nyman
You’ll often see questions about the practice of software testing that essentially boil down to this: “Which is better: manual testing or automated testing?” This is how many engineering managers do view the world and while they may throw in more words, what they are asking is that question.
What Is A Test Coach?? by Darryn Downey
Recently I have tried to move into the realm of test coaching. It’s an interesting field. Mostly cause nobody seems to have heard of the role.
Get on our radar by submitting your blog to our Testing Feeds or emailing something interesting to community@ministryoftesting.com
BUSINESS BLOG POSTS
Tools for Becoming a Successful Test Engineer by Scott Fitzpatrick
As the development lifecycle seemingly gets shorter and shorter due to the rise of the Agile development methodology, effective software testing is becoming more and more critical to an organization’s success.
App Usability Testing — The Core Components by Phil Edwards
It goes without saying that all apps whether they be native, web or hybrid must make a great first impression on the end user when it comes to their functionality and usability. In the real world however, extensive testing and the usability of the app is often overlooked.
The True Cost of Free Testing Tools by Bob Reselman
The open source movement has opened up a floodgate of software that costs nothing more than the time it takes for it to download. But, just because it’s free, doesn’t mean that it comes without cost.
Why API Discovery Is Important For A Tester? by Akshay Pai
With a lot of seamless interconnectivity, it is the APIs which has been successful in connecting different applications, bringing it together for the user. It is this connectivity which has made APIs very substantial for modern online connectivity by providing a par-excellent User Experience and an increased reach towards 3rd party applications. Thus, it is an important aspect to be well taken care of while testing.
Taking an Innovative Approach to Continuous Performance by Bruno Da Silva
At some point, IT performance was not the priority until performance failure was detected. Addressing performance is necessary but should always occur according to the risks you need to mitigate.
How do we foresee the future of Test Automation? by Cigniti Technologies
Test Automation is like a self-healing process for Software Testing and Quality Assurance. When software glitches keep mushrooming constantly, business risks grow and testing teams face major challenges.
PODCASTS
074 Advanced Real User Monitoring Tips & Tricks with Ben Rushloby PurePerformance
In this episode we dive deeper into RUM use cases around user behavior analytics, bridging the silos between Dev, Ops & Business and elaborate on why blindly optimizing individual page load times is most likely wasted time as you won’t impact what really matters: End-to-End User Experience!
Episode 362 — Google Caves To Public Outcry Around Chrome Privacy by Security in Five
A few weeks ago Google came under fire for automatically logging users into Chrome when they signed in to Google services. This did not go over well with the privacy concerned people, I did an episode on it, and Google listened. This episode goes over their change and how to disable that feature in Chrome.
52: pyproject.toml: the future of Python packaging — Brett Cannon by Test & Code
Brett Cannon discusses the changes afoot in Python packaging as a result of PEP 517, PEP 518, starting with “How did we get here?” and “Where are we going?”.
Ep 18 Rachel Tobac: Leveraging Creativity and a Neuroplastic Mindset by Humans of InfoSec
Rachel was a winner of the DEFCON Social Engineering Capture the Flag (SECTF) competition 3 years in a row, and has shared her animated story, OSINT experience, and the modern threat of Social Engineering.
Episode 27: Security As Nurturance by Modern Software Podcast
If security is warfare, the good guys don’t seem to be winning. Esteban Gutierrez, New Relic’s Director of Information Security, has a better metaphor: security as nurturance.
TECH
Stop building websites with infinite scroll! by Fatih Kadir Akin
Infinite scroll can be disorienting, uncontrollable, and can cause your users stress. In this article, we will explain why you need to stop building websites with infinite scroll. But to start, let’s look at a brief history of scrolling.
Chrome 71 will block any and all ads on sites with “abusive experiences” by Peter Bright
Google is promising to punish sites that offer what the company calls “abusive experiences.” Chrome 71, due for release in December, will blacklist sites that are repeat offenders and suppress all advertising on those sites.
The future of Information Architecture by Kari Meric
A speculative look at where Information Architecture might be going, given machine learning and voice interfaces.
Preventing Suicide with UX: A Case Study on Google Search by Geoff Grahman
I came clean about my long-running and ongoing battle with chronic depression last year in a blog post on my personal site. But don’t worry, things are no worse than they were then and this post is about something else. This post is about designing empathetic user experiences.
The 101 Course On Crafting 404 Pages by Shelby Rogers
A 404 page should do more than apologize for poor navigation on behalf of your website. Here’s why making an effort with a 404 page could better your website’s chances of people coming back despite the inconvenience, and how to track those errors to reduce how often people see it.
The VR Diversity Initiative Find Solutions For Disabilities Using Virtual Realityby Nina Salomons
Although the VR Diversity Initiative is not a hackathon, it very much felt like it during the fourth VR Diversity Initiative if you were a participant taking part in the VR Design workshop. Led by virtual reality artist Continuum, participants were put into teams of three for a day to start ‘project backpack’.
App Store Connect API is Here: How To Prepare For It by Shashikant Jagtap
Apple has started to roll out the New App Store Connect API with documentation for the developers. With App Store Connect API, the developer can automate entire workflows without relying on any third party tools.
UPCOMING MOT EVENTS
- Testing Ask Me Anything — CI/CD and Delivery Pipelines — Abby Bangser — 13th November 2018 — Save you space!
- Usability Boundaries & Why we Need Them — David Greenlees — 20th November 2018 — Register now!
- TestBash Essentials Brighton — 1 day — Wednesday 3rd April 2019 — Super Early Bird Tickets on Sale!
- TestBash Brighton — 1 day — Friday 5th April 2019 — Super Early Bird Tickets on Sale!
- TestBash Netherlands — 2 days — Thursday 23rd — Friday 24th May 2019 -Subscribe to Launch List
TOOLS
Contraste
Contraste is a simple app for checking the accessibility of text against the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).
visme
Easy-to-use flowchart maker. Connect shapes and lines. Customize colors, fonts and backgrounds.
PERFORMANCE
A Netflix Web Performance Case Study by Addy Osmani
There are no silver bullets to web performance. Simple static pages benefit from being server-rendered with minimal JavaScript. Libraries can provide great value for complex pages when used with care.
3 JavaScript Performance Mistakes You Should Stop Doing by Yotam Kadishay
What if I told you everything you knew was a lie, what will happen if you learn some of the key features our beloved ECMAScript have published over the recent years, are actually dangerous performance traps, sugar coated in a slick looking one line callback functional code?
SECURITY
In Groundbreaking Decision, Feds Say Hacking DRM to Fix Your Electronics Is Legalby Jason Koebler
The new exemptions are a major win for the right to repair movement and give consumers wide latitude to legally repair the devices they own.
From Novice to Apprentice: How to Start Participating in Capture the Flag Eventsby Christine McGarry
This article is aimed at those who are early in their InfoSec or Incident Response career and those who are mid-career but have never played in a Capture the Flag (CTF) event. If you’ve ever considered participating in a CTF but felt that you didn’t have the skills or were otherwise not welcome to play: this is for you.
Chinese ‘gait recognition’ tech IDs people by how they walk by Dake Kang
Chinese authorities have begun deploying a new surveillance tool: “gait recognition” software that uses people’s body shapes and how they walk to identify them, even when their faces are hidden from cameras.
Facial image matching system risks ‘chilling effect’ on freedoms, rights groups sayby Christopher Knaus
Civil rights groups have warned a vast, powerful system allowing the near real-time matching of citizens’ facial images risks a “profound chilling effect” on protest and dissent.
Netflix releases desktop versions of device security app Stethoscope by Zeljka Zorz
In early 2017, the Netflix team open sourced Stethoscope, an application that collects information about users’ devices and provides them with recommendations for securing them.
This Tool Shows Exposed Cameras Around Your Neighbourhood by Joseph Cox
Surveillance cameras are pretty much a standard when living in many cities. And many of those cameras are connected to the internet, and may be deliberately or inadvertently open for others to tune into. Exposed devices can be everywhere, from businesses, to schools, to inside homes. A new tool allows you to see where insecure cameras are physically located.
Facebook wants to reveal your name to the weirdo standing next to you by Lisa Vaas
Not entirely unlike dogs socializing via their nether regions, Facebook’s latest idea is to wirelessly sniff out people around you and make friend suggestions based on what it finds. Only it’s slightly more intrusive than how dogs do it.
ACCESSIBILITY
Enforcing accessibility best practices with component proptypes by Brad Frost
I’m diving into React a lot more, and I’m specifically focused on making rock-solid, dumb presentational components that can be ingested by other applications. Part of making these components rock-solid is providing some definition and guardrails for the props associated with each component. Enter PropTypes.
Access & Use
Access & Use shows what it needs to make dynamic elements in websites accessible and usable for all.
Simple recommendations for writing text descriptions that make a big difference by Léonie Watson
Really good accessibility takes a strong strategy, thoughtful design, and robust technical implementation, but often it’s the small things that make all the difference to the person consuming your content.
Trouble Tabbing To Tabs and Cheeky Checking Checkboxes by Scott O’Hara
Sometimes, despite best efforts, there will be accessibility issues in a code base. Sometimes, those issues can create an awkward or annoying user experience. And sometimes, those issues aren’t a result of a developer or their team doing anything incorrectly. This is a tale of two bugs. The first concerns Tab Widgets, the second Checkboxes.
The Web Accessibility Introduction I Wish I Had by Max Antonucci
Hello again, past self. I’m sending you another message from a future where it’s finally getting colder, you got the guts to go to therapy, and that thing under the floorboards somehow escaped. Most importantly, your future job responsibilities focus much more focus on web accessibility.
AUTOMATION
JUnit5 Assertion Migration Strategy by Alan Richardson
Rather than migration your assertions line by line, create an abstraction class to represent the new implementation and then perform inline refactoring.
Find Files Inside a Folder in your Automated Test by imALittleTester
Context: you have a folder containing some files. You need to find all the files whose name contains some expected value in this folder and all its’ sub-folders.
What’s the Document Object Model, and why you should know how to use itby Leonardo Maldonado
So, you’ve studied HTML, you’ve created your first tags, learned about CSS, made beautiful forms, amazing buttons, responsive pages and have started to show everyone how amazing all that was.
JOBS
Software Quality Engineer — Nice area, PACA. France
Member of the Software Quality Assurance Team, with departments in France and Brazil, you play a key role in providing confidence in the level of quality of either internally developed or contracted projects.
Automation Software Tester — Liverpool, UK
As the newest member of our Testing team, you will be spotlighting your automation skills in working on our flagship web page and mobile applications, creating automation frameworks.
MEETUPS
Meetups happening soon!
- Are Your Integrated Tests A Scam?! — Phoenix
- Thinker, Tester, Lawyer, Spy — An exclusive Test Bash Brighton preview! — Edinburgh
- November #MidsTest with Ioana Finaru — Midlands
- MoT in CLE First Meetup — Cleveland
- Ministry of Testing Peterborough — Vernon Richards, Adam Gask and Shey Crompton — Peterborough
- DevOps Introduction & Continuous Testing — KSA
- SWTC Manchester — Testing Interviews — Manchester
