Ministry Of Testing

We continue our run of interviews with upcoming TestBash speakers by chatting to Brighton-based Kim Knup, who will be presenting at TestBash San Francisco about the challenges of testing voice-activated devices, as well as being Lead Designer for next year's TestBash Brighton. Along the way, we also talk about Kim's involvement in the many facets of Brighton's testing scene, and her passion for usability. There's music from Germany, the UK and USA (including two of Neil's favourite karaoke tracks), and if you've got an Alexa, Google Assistant or Siri-compatible device, you might want to mute it for the second half of this episode. If you'd like to learn more from Kim, you can catch up with her on Twitter @Punkmik! Kim's Links: Meetup.com: Ministry of Testing - Brighton Software Testing Clinic TestBash San Francisco 2018 TestBash Brighton 2019 YouTube: Die Ärzte - Rebell Photos from the first Brighton test meetup four years ago Nielsen Norman Group (Jakob Nielse

We kick-off a bumper month of episodes with a visit to the island by Elizabeth Zagroba, to talk about the ideas behind her upcoming presentation at TestBash Germany, entitled "Doubt Builds Trust". Among the discussions, there are debates about the challenges of saying "I don't know", stories about exploring doubt within interview situations, and thoughts about the relationship between doubt and curiosity. Plus, Neil finally finds a way for his frequent screw-ups to reinforce a salient point! Elizabeth shares stories of how music and technology have been interwoven throughout her life, and her song choices are spread across classical, musicals and jazz, with a small helping of funk thrown in for good measure. You can catch up with Elizabeth on Twitter @ezagroba. Elizabeth's Links: TestBash Germany 2018 WNYC - New York Public Radio Wikipedia: Ys (mythical French sunken city) The Reddit thread Neil referred to (sadly now with deleted posts) Wikipedia: Mellophone Elizabeth'

The Super Testing Bros talk to Michele and Pete about owning and improving office culture in the August edition of our monthly MoT podcast, 2018. Ministry of Testing and Super Testing Bros are partnering up for 2018 to bring you regular pods on the last Monday of the month. You can listen to and subscribe to this podcast on iTunes and SoundCloud! Plus follow what The Super Testing Bros are up to on Twitter.

This week's interview comes courtesy of Michele Playfair, discussing some of the ideas which form the foundation of her forthcoming TestBash Australia talk, "A Tester's Guide To Changing Hearts And Minds". In an episode themed around trust, communication and collaboration, we talk about how testing overlaps with programming, teaching and marketing; how introverts can get outside their comfort zone; and whether Michele is secretly trying to start a war. Along the way, we pay tribute to the work of Jerry Weinberg, and play Michele's song selections which each have a geographic significance. If you'd like to get in touch with Michele, she can be found on Twitter (and all of the other usual places) @MichelePlayfair. Michele's Links: YOW! Conferences & Workshops TestBash Australia 2018 Gov.UK: Get Into Teaching First Avenue, Minneapolis Dan Ashby tweet which I falsely attributed to Stephen Janaway! Leanpub: Gerald Weinberg - Weinberg on Writing: The Fieldstone Method

Our latest castaway is Matthew Bretten, joining us to discuss his upcoming adventure in presenting a talk titled "You Can Become A Toolsmith Too" at the inaugural Test.bash(); Manchester. Continuing the discussion from the previous episode about toolsmiths, Matt shares examples of how testers can break into creating valuable tooling, finding developer allies, and there's some meta-discussion about preparing and running technical workshops. Matt's song selections are linked to different pivotal moments of his life, touching upon his favourite live artists, the films that he watched growing up, video games, and the Manchester musician with a connection to Matt's grandmother. If you'd like to catch up with Matt, you can find him on Twitter @matthewbretten. Matthew's Links: Let's Talk About Tests, Baby Screen Testing - Hackers Test.bash(); Manchester 2018 Football Manager YouTube: Frank Klepacki - Hell March Let's Talk About Tests: Episode 94 (TestBash Manchester

This week we're joined by Mark Winteringham, co-creator of both the Software Testing Clinic and Automation in Testing, for a conversation about the aforementioned initiatives and much more besides. On an epically hot day, Neil and Mark talk about building pathways for learning, optimising delivery for classroom and online training, supporting worldwide franchises, and how to get testing talked about more within universities. Between the discussion are songs which have inspired Mark in the fields of songwriting, experimentation, work-life balance, the Internet of Things, and we get our first a cappella selection. Mark can be reached on Twitter @2bittester. Mark's Links: Software Testing Clinic Automation in Testing Ministry of Testing Dojo course: Introduction To HTTP (by Mark Winteringham) Ministry of Testing Dojo course: Let's Build an API Checking Framework (by Mark Winteringham) Ministry of Testing Dojo course: The Building Blocks of the Internet (by Mark Winteringham) Screen Testing

The Super Testing Bros talk to Paul and Lee about Neurodiversity within testing in the July edition of our monthly MoT podcast, 2018. Ministry of Testing and Super Testing Bros are partnering up for 2018 to bring you regular pods on the last Monday of the month. You can listen to and subscribe to this podcast on iTunes and SoundCloud! Plus follow what The Super Testing Bros are up to on Twitter.

This episode of Testers' Island Discs was supported by TestRail, the test management tool that makes testing simpler - it works the way you test. Learn more and try it for free at www.gurock.com/testrail. Our latest special guest is Maaike Brinkhof, one of our most musically adept castaways so far, for some discussion about the connections between learning to play an instrument and striving for self-improvement as a tester. We discuss human biases (part of Maaike's upcoming talk at TestBash Manchester), the joy of mob programming, helping teams to uncover unknown unknowns, and the benefits of utilising "analog time" to recover from the madness of the world. On the music front, Maaike's selections are a mixture of metal and classical, with some interesting symphonic and folk-infused subgenres between the grunting! For those who'd like to explore metal some more, Maaike has created a communal playlist "Testers Metal top songs" on Spotify. If you'd like to get in touch

This episode of Testers' Island Discs was supported by TestRail, the test management tool that makes testing simpler - it works the way you test. Learn more and try it for free at www.gurock.com/testrail. Our latest castaway is Paul Maxwell-Walters, joining us from Down Under to compare and contrast England and Australia, and discuss his upcoming talk at TestBash Australia, "Avoid Sleepwalking to Failure! On Abstractions and Keeping it Real in Software Teams". We get into a bunch of philosophical and real-world political discussions, drawing parallels to our experiences in the world of software testing, sharing tales of teams who may have fallen foul of "sleepwalking" through their processes and discussing tips on how to help teams to negotiate these everyday pitfalls, and how to speak up within harsh working environments. If you'd like to chat to Paul, you can reach him on Twitter @TestingRants, and learn more about the Sydney Testers meetup group @SydneyTesters. Paul's Li

The Super Testing Bros talk to Paul and Toria about Alan Page and Brent Jensen’s Modern Testing Principles in the June edition of our monthly MoT podcast 2018. Ministry of Testing and Super Testing Bros are partnering up for 2018 to bring you regular pods on the last Monday of the month. You can listen to and subscribe to this podcast on iTunes and SoundCloud! Plus follow what The Super Testing Bros are up to on Twitter.

This episode of Testers' Island Discs was supported by TestRail, the test management tool that makes testing simpler - it works the way you test. Learn more and try it for free at www.gurock.com/testrail. It's a warm Northern welcome to the island for Claire Reckless, who comes ashore to talk about the Manchester tech scene, her recent ventures into conference speaking and hosting the Software Testing Clinic, and how these play into her ongoing battles with impostor syndrome. In amongst the discussions about getting out of your comfort zone and overcoming your inner fears, Claire shares the path that she has taken to become more comfortable, and earns brownie points for picking a song by one of Neil's all-time favourite bands. You can find Claire on Twitter at @clairereckless! Claire's Links: MoneySuperMarket Software Testing Clinic Nordic Testing Days YouTube: Nordic Testing Days 2018 presentations Manchester Evening News: BBC's Salford move key to Northern Powerhouse MediaCit

This episode of Testers' Island Discs was supported by TestRail, the test management tool that makes testing simpler - it works the way you test. Learn more and try it for free at www.gurock.com/testrail. You've heard him name-checked for the past few episodes, so now it's time to hear from the man himself, Danny Dainton! Danny talks to us about his unique journey to the island, including a ten-year spell in the military and a difficult first experience with testing. We get deep into a technical discussion about how to use the API development/testing tool Postman, and talk more broadly about discovery, applied learning, writing and helping others, including Danny's accolades on Stack Overflow - with some seriously varied songs along the way. If you'd like to reach Danny on social media, head over to @DannyDainton and/or @south_west_test! Danny's Links: Postman Postman for QA Teams TestBash Brighton 2018: Danny Dainton - Learning to Learn - My Struggles and Successes YouTube:

This month, The Super Testing Bros talk to Ashley Hunsberger and Marcus Merrell about the recent changes they’ve made to the SeleniumConf to be more diverse & inclusive, pay to speak, and other conference-related chatter. Ministry of Testing and Super Testing Bros are partnering up for 2018 to bring you regular pods on the last Monday of the month. You can listen to and subscribe to this podcast on iTunes and SoundCloud! Plus follow what The Super Testing Bros are up to on Twitter.

This episode of Testers' Island Discs was supported by TestRail, the test management tool that makes testing simpler - it works the way you test. Learn more and try it for free at www.gurock.com/testrail. It's time to cross the streams, as Neil is joined by Dan Billing, his co-host on the Screen Testing podcast and an all-round security testing guru. In a predictably madcap episode, we throw away most of the questions and get into discussing the deep role that music (and movies) play within Dan's personal and testing lives. There's also some serious discussion about Dan's professional influences, mentors, and coping with anxiety, illness and loss. You can catch Dan on Twitter at @TheTestDoctor! Dan's Links: Screen Testing podcast YouTube: On Her Majesty's Secret Service opening theme (John Barry) Wikipedia: List of music featured on Doctor Who IMDB: Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll (Ian Dury movie) Chailey Heritage Foundation Brittany Hunter: Of Software Designers

This episode of Testers' Island Discs was supported by TestRail, the test management tool that makes testing simpler - it works the way you test. Learn more and try it for free at www.gurock.com/testrail. This week's guest is Amber Race (@ambertests), who brings a selection of topics for discussion which are almost as eclectic as her musical choices, which include rap, folk, classical and hard rock. Amber and Neil share anecdotes of bridging the divide between developers and testers, and talk about the importance of empathy, teamwork, gratitude and humility. Links: Amber's session at Agile Testing Days 2018 Richard Bradshaw: Launching Automation in Testing Eater.com: Inside Seattle's new Amazon Go store BBC News: Facebook-Cambridge Analytica data scandal Cassandra Leung: I Downloaded My Facebook Data - Here's What I Found Listen to and subscribe to this podcast on iTunes and SoundCloud Sign up to be a guest on the show Testers' Island Discs playlist on Spotify Testers'

This month, we talk to Katrina Clokie about her book A Practical Guide to Testing in DevOps, a bit about DevOps culture, and what it means to be a tester in the world of DevOps. Ministry of Testing and Super Testing Bros are partnering up for 2018 to bring you regular pods on the last Monday of the month. You can listen to and subscribe to this podcast on iTunes and SoundCloud! Plus follow what The Super Testing Bros are up to on Twitter.

This episode of Testers' Island Discs was supported by TestRail, the test management tool that makes testing simpler - it works the way you test. Learn more and try it for free at www.gurock.com/testrail. Andrew comes to the island to share stories from TestBash Brighton 2018, highlighting a few of his favourite sessions and drawing parallels to his own career experiences. He also brings a particularly wide variety of songs spanning a range of genres, including satire, movies, videogames, musical theatre, and artists that it's okay to like even if they're not "cool". You can reach Andrew on the Ministry of Testing Slack or via Twitter (@TestingChef).   TestBash Brighton talks discussed in detail: Rosie Hamilton - Discovering Logic in Testing Danny Dainton - Learning to Learn: My Struggles and Successes Alan Page - Experiences in Modern Testing 99 Second Talks   Other Links: Screen Testing: Doctor Who - The Deadly Assassin (feat. Andrew Morton) Andrew Morton & A

In this podcast, The Super Testing Bros are joined by Dougie Hoskins and Antonia Landi to discuss all things mobile testing! Find out some of their testing strategies and top tips for testing web apps on mobile and native apps. As well as their thoughts on the benefits and challenges of testing on real devices and simulators. Ministry of Testing and Super Testing Bros are partnering up for 2018 to bring you regular pods on the last Monday of the month. You can listen to and subscribe to this podcast on iTunes and SoundCloud! Plus follow what The Super Testing Bros are up to on Twitter.

This episode of Testers' Island Discs was supported by TestRail, the test management tool that makes testing simpler - it works the way you test. Learn more and try it for free at www.gurock.com/testrail. It's a themed episode this week, as Mel brings us five of her favourite duets for a lively discussion about pairing in the workplace, and how effective communication can improve the flow of information within our teams.   We talk about how to set up a strong pairing environment, how to run sessions over a remote connection, and negotiating with colleagues from different disciplines. You'll also learn about several of Mel's earlier career trajectory, including one role which makes her better at teeing-up song links than Neil!   You can reach Mel on the Ministry of Testing Slack or via Twitter (@melthetester).   Mel's Links: Agile Alliance: Pair Programming Llewellyn Falco: Llewellyn's strong-style pairing ThoughtWorks: Effective Navigation in Pair Progra

This episode of Testers' Island Discs was supported by TestRail, the test management tool that makes testing simpler - it works the way you test. Learn more and try it for free at www.gurock.com/testrail. After an illness-enforced absence, the island is once again open for business as we welcome Karo Stolzenburg to talk about her experiences in Cambridge, the growth of the Software Testing Clinic, and an unavoidable discussion about Brexit. We also get into discussions about creating safe environments for learning, generating test ideas and avoiding cognitive biases in our testing, whilst also finding time to hear a range of song selections which span TV themes, 90s rock, and our first non-English-language offering. If you'd like to get in touch with Karo, you can reach her on Twitter @karostol or read her blog at https://putzerfisch.wordpress.com. Karo's Links: Meetup.com: Ministry of Testing Cambridge Ministry of Testing Slack: #uk-cambridgeshire channel BBC News: Cambridge bucks Brexit trend (73.8% vot