When to Say No to Automation
TESTING AND THE COMMUNITY
Connecting the Dots — Empowering People Through Play with Nicola Sedgwick & Christina Ohanian
Nicola and Christina will teach, play and demonstrate games that will have direct practical uses to bring teams together to work more productively and reduce communication difficulties. Learn more at Nicola and Christina’s workshop at London Tester Gathering Workshops in June!
Skills required for testing machine learning systems by Jack
I came across this short piece and wondered what others testing machine learning systems thought? (especially anyone testing reinforcement learning or probabilistic models). What skills do you need when you are testing policies or models?
When to Say No to Automation with Jack Taylor
We all know that automation is a massive part of what we do and for the most part it greatly enhances our test coverage, reduces workload and risk and increases confidence in our software. However, there are times when automation isn’t required to achieve the greatest test efficiency. At TestBash Germany, Jack will help you understand when to say no.
Dangers of Generalization in Software Testing by Bertold Kolics
This is a rant about a worrisome trend I see in blog posts, news articles, tutorials all over the web. Authors explain how they solved or addressed a particular problem in a particular context, and then continue on delivering a message as if it applied to all aspects of software testing.
Thoughts from a TDD kata mob by Gregory Paciga
Test Driven Development has been on my mind lately. I’ve heard from time to time that some people don’t consider Test Driven Development to be a testing activity. Lisa Crispin recently said as much in a piece on modeling test automation, and it’s not obvious to me why it shouldn’t be seen that way.
Learning From Failure: The Tricky iOS Environment by MelTheTester
There are times when our work, as a team, as testers on a team can give us insight into how we can improve things for the overall success of the product. Often those things are issues or defects which can present themselves at the most inconvenient times, in the most inconsistent ways.
Augmented Reality May Not Be Exciting by Shiva Mathivanan
Oh wait, what is Augmented Reality? Hey, I know a lot about Augmented reality and it is of course so exciting. Why the hell do you think it may not be exciting?
A B C, V R T by undevelopedbruce
So I did a talk at the South West Test meetup in Bristol last week (at the time of writing first draft, probably last year by the time I finish…) and someone asked afterwards if I could make it into a blog post.
The fight to regulate dangerous design is heating up by Katharine Schwab
Yesterday, the U.K.’s Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), which oversees data and privacy, announced a radical proposal to regulate children’s privacy online.
TOOLS
Kontrast
Quickly check and adjust contrast in realtime in your browser to meet the standards of WCAG 2.0 (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines).
Helperbird
Helperbird is a browser extension that gives people the features and customization to make reading and browsing the web easier. Including specialized fonts, changing of the background color, font colors, text to speech, overlays, ruler and more!
BUSINESS POSTS
The Case for Using Code Review Checklists by Patrick Londa
At the 22nd International Conference on Software Engineering, Alastair Dunsmore, Marc Roper, and Murray Wood presented the findings of their study on three different techniques for code review.
Is Mob Programming Right For You? Amitai Schleier Explains How Teams Can Make It Work by Alex McPeak
In “Mob Programming Explained,” Amitai gives an introduction to mob programming for those who may be intrigued by the concept but skeptical of its practicality and efficiency.
Will AI-based software be able to write effective manual testing tests?
The proliferation of AI-based systems, and specifically decision-making systems, constantly raises the question of whether these systems can replace the manual testing process, and the testers.
Test Your Service APIs through Test Automation by Michael Battat
You need to test your service APIs. You may expand your application into a service API. Or, you may consume someone else’s service API. How do you guarantee the behavior of your own service API?
PODCASTS
250: Pushing Security Testing Left, Like a Boss with Tanya Janca by Joe Colantonio
Today we’ll be test talking with security testing expert Tanya Janca about application security and more. Tanya is passionate about application security and evangelizing software security and will share why you should be, too. Listen up to hear how Tanya can make even a topic like security fun.
Episode 476 — Serverless And Container Deployments, What Are They? by Security in Five
If you are working in or looking to develop applications for the cloud you probably have heard about serverless and container deployments. This episode talks about the similarities and differences for managing and securing them.
Managing Global Testing Teams by Testing One on One
The world is now a Global Village, and this is bringing many good things, but also quite a lot of challenges.
Episode 477 — Amazon Employees Are Listening To Your Alexa Recordings by Security in Five
A report came out that confirmed that Amazon employees have been listening to your Alexa recordings more frequently than recently admitted to. This episode goes into the details and gives some thoughts around these devices behaviors.
125: Pick of the thief! by Smashing Security
WannaCry’s “accidental hero” pleads guilty to malware charges, Samsung and Nokia have fingerprint fumbles, the NCSC publishes a list of 100,000 dreadful passwords, and Apple finds itself at the centre of an identity mix-up.
UPCOMING MOT EVENTS
- Online Meetup: Knowing your Automation with Hugh McCamphill — 2 hours — Thursday 9th May 2019
- Masterclass: Inclusive Collaboration — how our differences can make the difference — Tuesday 14th May 8pm UK Time
- TestBash Netherlands — 2 days — Thursday 23rd — Friday 24th May 2019 — Tickets on Sale!
- London Tester Gathering Workshops — 3 days — Wednesday 26th — Friday 28th June 2019 — Super Early Bird Tickets on Sale!
- TestBash Germany — 2 days — Thursday 12th — Friday 13th September 2019 — Super Early Bird Tickets on Sale!
- TestBash Manchester — 2 days — Wednesday 2nd — Thursday 3rd October 2019 -Super Early Bird Tickets on Sale!
- Test.bash(); — 1 day — Friday 4th October 2019 — Super Early Bird Tickets on Sale!
- TestBash Australia — 2 days — Thursday 24th — Friday 25th October 2019 — Super Early Bird Tickets on Sale!
- TestBash New Zealand — 1 day — Tuesday 29th October 2019 — Sign up to the launch list
- TestBash San Francisco — 2 days — Wednesday 6th — Thursday 7th November 2019 — Sign up to the launch list
AUTOMATION
Top Automation Talks From TestBash
We’ve gathered the top 12 automation o99talks from our TestBash conferences! There are talks from Bas Dijkstra, Viv Richards, Alan Richardson, Gwen Diagram and lots more.
Test automation is not a project, it’s a process by Nicolas Canseco
I have just read Stėphane Colson article about good practices when beginning with test automation. He says: “Automation is a real new project and should be treated as such.” I disagree.
ACCESSIBILITY
Accessibility what about autism? by Matt Parker
I’m back and I’m on a mission. “Yeh yeh, that old chestnut”. As part of my personal aim to become better at public speaking I was lucky enough to be given the chance to speak at Testbash Brighton. This was as part of an amazing track of talks relating to mental health and well being by some of the most impressive speakers on some of the most challenging topics.
Move Ya! Or maybe, don’t, if the user prefers-reduced-motion! by Thomas Steiner
Not everyone likes decorative animations or transitions, and some users outright experience motion sickness when faced with parallax scrolling, zooming effects, etc.
Accessibility in Agile Transformational Practices by Dylan Barrell
In a lot of ways, accessibility is talked about and practiced as if it is a hydra dragon. Every time you think you’ve made an improvement, you cut off one head of the accessibility dragon and two heads grow back.
What’s new in Accessibility in 2019 — standards, authoring tools, frameworks and design thinking by Jonathan Hassell
This is the final part of my review of what is happening across the Digital Accessibility Ecosystem in 2019.
Why You Should Measure UX Attitudes by Jeff Sauro
Watching how people interact with an interface tells you a lot about what works and what needs improvement.
Icons: avoid temptation and start with user needs by Ben Cullimore
Icons represent ideas in a simple, visual way. But we must use them carefully, and only where they help people. Users’ needs must come first, and we shouldn’t be afraid to challenge how people use them.
SECURITY
Blochainbandit stole $54 million of Ethereum by guessing weak keys by John E Dunn
Someone has been quietly pilfering Ethereum (ETH) cryptocurrency worth millions of dollars without anyone noticing or, apparently, caring.
GoDaddy takes down 15,000 subdomains used for online scams by Catalin Cimpanu
Web hosting provider and domain registrar GoDaddy has taken down more than 15,000 subdomains that were being used as part of a spam operation that lured users on web pages selling fake products.
Hacker could locate thousands of cars and kill their engines remotely via poorly-secured GPS tracking apps by Graham Cluley
Over a relatively short of period of time, computers changed from something you kept on your desk, to something you carried in your pocket, to something you sat inside as you drove to work.
An inside look at how credential stuffing operations work by Catalin Cimpanu
Credential stuffing attacks are one of today’s most prevalent threats to online businesses everywhere. But despite this threat rising on everyone’s radar in the infosec community, very little is known about how criminal groups are performing these attacks.
Vetting the Security of Mobile Applications by Michael Ogata Josh Franklin Jeffrey Voas Vincent Sritapan Stephen Quirolgico
Mobile applications are an integral part of our everyday personal and professional lives. As both public and private organizations rely more on mobile applications, ensuring that they are reasonably free from vulnerabilities and defects becomes paramount. This paper outlines and details a mobile application vetting process.
JOBS
Automation Tester — Brighton, UK
A leading digital software company whose development offices are based in Central Brighton are looking to recruit a Tester with good Automation experience to work alongside their existing testers and development team who build, maintain and support a range of digital systems used by millions of users worldwide.
QA Specialist — South Jordan, UT. US
We are seeking an entry level QA Specialist to join our team in April, May or June 2019. This individual will work closely with developers, product managers, and user experience designers to help facilitate high-quality production releases.
MEETUPS
Meetups happening soon!
- Making life easy with the ARTOS Testing Framework — Auckland
- What is testing? — Software Testing Clinic Cambridge
- Monitorer en devOps, c’est tester ! — Lyon
- Interviewing Testers — Software Testing Clinic 1.11 — Brighton & Hove
- Workshop: Having fun generating Synthetic Data for test — Atlanta
- #NottsTest: Postman & Newman — Automated API checks with Ioana Porcarasu — Nottingham
