On 14th-Sept, I got to present in the STeP-IN Forum's event in Hyderabad. The event was Software Testing Conference. It was primarily a 2 day conference, in which the first day on 14th-Sept was the Pre-Conference Tutorials.
Tutorials were different than the sessions on the normal conference day as these went in-depth into the topic and were more or less like a Workshop of about half-a-day. I had a good experience overall as i presented on the topic of Demystifying Globalization Testing .
I could cover the different aspects of Globalization testing both via presentation and live demonstration, which apparently was decently received (though i am still expecting a formal feedback update from the Organizers).
The content about Globalization Testing that i have written in this blog purely from my experience was always as helpful in conducting the session of this magnitude.
The best part that i liked was that the session eventually turned out to be quite interactive and there were lots of discussions and meaningful interactions with the audience during the entire session.
Will upload the presentation soon.
************************Update on 23rd-Sept-2011************************
I have uploaded the Presentation i delivered at this session here
Tuesday, September 20, 2011
Thursday, August 18, 2011
"An Attempt to define Personal Excellence..."- Presentation at BWST-3
I had an interesting experience being a part of Bangalore Workshop on Software Testing-3 . While i will write about my experience on being a part of this Workshop separately, i intended to first share a summary on my presentation in this Workshop.
The theme of this workshop as unique in many sense. It was Personal excellence & skill development . Being a part of quite a few conferences in the past, this was arguably the first workshop (or a conference) dedicated to this so relevant topic. That was exactly one of my first thoughts when i got to know about Speaking opportunity here i.e. Personal Excellence is so very important but most of the external conferences are so focused on rather external skills (Some call them Technical Skills, Some Hard skills, Some Job skills...).
In short, i knew i had to contribute to this opportunity and i chose a topic quite related and close to my experience. My topic was-
An Attempt to define Personal Excellence- Some Snippets from my experience
I have uploaded the presentation here .
This session was quite close to my heart as i chose to spoke on some experiences that i have been through in the past, which has largely helped me to shape my mind and thinking. While i need to get better at video recording my sessions but till the time i do so, i wanted to Summarize the key points of my talk here. Before you proceed, just to mention, what follows are just my thoughts on Personal Excellence, which may differs from yours. So do share your perspective.
Some Key points i presented:
- This presentation is just “An attempt to define Personal Excellence…” rather than a definite guide to Personal Excellence as i am no definite authority on Personal Excellence.
Essence of Personal Excellence: This dialog from the movie
3 Idiots define the essence of Personal Excellence for me
Kisi Mahapurush ne kaha hai, success ke pichhe mat bhago. Excellence! Excellence ka pichha karo. Kamyabi jhakkh mar ke tumhare pichhe aayegi. (Some wise soul has told that, don’t run after success. Excellence! Follow and conquer Excellence! Post which success will just come running at your door steps.)
I believe most of the answers regarding Personal Excellence reside inside us rather than outside.
Reading shapes your mind One of the quotes that i found Inspirational is-
If you read for just half an hour everyday, you could finish a 250 page book in just two weeks' time. That's twenty six books a year. A hundred books in next four years.
To learn and grow, make reading (books that make you better) your religion. Just think, what difference would that make to the quality of your mind, your career, your life ?
Habit of reading in itself cannot change you unless you have the necessary will: One of my learnings have been that Reading books or Reading quotes in itself cannot Change you. These acts or habits are powerless in a way as in the mere act of reading alone cannot change you. At the most what it can do is to Inspire you. Unless one matches that Inspiration with will and Inspiration to bring you that positive change you wanted, the whole act of Reading may not be that fruitful in the end.
- With the advent of Globalization and the adoption of
Employees first culture, More than ever in the history of human kind, there is now an unrelenting focus on people and Individual Excellence and Organizations are beginning to understand the same.
Personal Excellence=Excellence in various Life situations: I find Personal Excellence very closely associated with how one deals with different situations you find yourself in. Most of us generally gets to deal with myriad of situations when executing our professions. Some can be easy, Some will be tough for sure. Its actually how one gets to handle the different situations defines the level of success one enjoys. You can either be faced with a tough boss or tough colleague, or with a situation of people around you being fired, or even the situation of having to convey a bad news (as a testers we are often) or even the situation of having promoted, there can be numerous such situations.
Shane Warne once said-
Never worry about the situation you are in because that is already upon you. Instead ask yourself how can you win from here.
An uncluttered mind and an ability to think on feet are important when dealing with situations specific to Conveying the bad news (last minute bugs, not so pleasant news about Product Quality etc.) as there can be a lot of unexpected conversations during these situations. Preparing for worse is a wise move but keeping your mind clouded with worse happening doesnt help. As Michael Fox once said- "Never think too much about the worse for it may never happens. If you keep thinking about the worse and Even if it happens by chance, you would have lived it twice.".
Handling Disappointments: The Unexpected conversations in the above situations can also lead to disappointments. Handling disappointments successfully is as important as handling the successes in one's career.
I found Don Shula's twenty-four hour rule quite relevant in managing disappointments at workplace. As Don Shula says-
I had a twenty-four hour rule. I allowed myself, my coaches, and our players a maximum of twenty-four hours after football game to celebrate a victory or bemoan a defeat. During that time, everyone was encouraged to experience the thrill of victory or the agony of defeat as deeply as possible, while learning as much as we could from that same experience. Once the twenty-four hour deadline had passed, we put it behind us and focused our energies on preparing for next opponent.
Difference between "Commitment" and "Interest"
For managing multiple tasks and passions at work and in life in general, it is important to be able to distinguish between the tasks you are merely interested in as against the tasks you are truly committed for. As Ken Blanchard says in his book "The Heart of a Leader"
I learned from author and consultant Art Turock that we need to make a distinction between being interested and being committed. When you are "interested" in doing something, you only do it when its convenient, but when you are "committed", you follow through no matter what, no excuse."
Managing time and priorities Another aspect that i find quite relevant in managing multiple tasks and passions is Effective time management and effort prioritization. I have learned that managing time well is more about managing yourself well so that you can make most of the time.
Subroto Bagchi in his book- “The Professional” mentions-
It is probably more effective to watch and learn from people who actually seem to manage their time well, and who feel productive and satisfied. My experience of meeting many such people and working with them tells me the primary quality they all have is self-discipline. If someone does not have basic self-discipline, you will soon find that poor time management is just one of their many problems.
On Prioritization-
The issue some people face is not the absence of a goal, whether big or small. The issue is their multiplicity. For people with resources, it is the lack of prioritization that becomes a big problem . It is important to prioritize one’s life. Ask what is really important to you. Also ask why this thing is so important and are you willing to commit yourself completely to it.
The prioritization of work is more often as simple as having discipline to put down all your tasks on a paper or document and number them in order of execution. Simple. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Setting your own benchmarks: Most people benchmark their progress with the number of promotions one gets and after how long. This may be a right benchmark depending upon your goals and aspirations but more often this is typically done to keep up with rather false societal norms. It is important to set own benchmarks for self and work towards having a body of work that you can be proud of and remembered for. Getting promoted alone may not be the best benchmark for one's career. It is not always a true measure of excellence in job.
The need to Initiate, Getting Started: In our work places, how many ideas (initiated by others or self) do we reject everyday either by saying or within our minds thinking they are worthless? How many times we get scared to ask a question in a large gathering thinking that people will ridicule even a single slip of tongue? How many times our own self stops us from trying something new just because that very something new will break the routine way of doing things ? I salute you if you answer "None" to any or all of these questions. But the fact of matter is that in most of the situations, without realizing, we fail to initiate. Many ideas die a silent death just because they are not allowed to come out, Just because we don’t get started. As Seth Godin says in his book- "Poke the Box"
The essence of human is to get started
So for a change raise your hand to take up an initiative you have no knowledge about. That very act will make you better than those who have knowledge but no will to get started. Any Knowledge and Skill can be attained much faster than you can imagine, it is often the willingness to get started that separates Achievers from Average employees, from Dispensable to indispensable employees.
How well do we ask for feedback often separates how much better do we get ? Paul Arden in his book- Whatever you think, think the opposite says-
Ask for a Slap in the face.
Let me explain- if you ask someone your piece of work and you ask them “What do you think ?”, they will probably say its ok because they don’t want to offend you. Next time, instead of asking what is right, ask for What is wrong in this piece of work ? This question usually changes the equation a bit. They may not say what you want to hear but the chances are that they will give you a truthful criticism. Truth hurts but in a long run it is better than a pat on the back.
What’s your definition of "Done" and how Religiously do you follow it ?
When someone says I have Done something, how would you know that something is really Done.
As Subroto Bagchi says beautifully in his book “The Professional”-
"The quality to do what you have said you will do, in the time you have committed to must be applied to the smallest of tasks in your life. Without it, you not only disrespect others, you disrespect yourself."
- The Final point i made in the presentation was that The very idea of Personal Excellence goes beyond self. This may sound contradictory to what i mentioned in the beginning but i believe that the whole notion of Personal Excellence can sometimes (and often) make ourselves very Selfish. After all, by its very nature, Personal Excellence is close to you. I was reading this interesting story of Mirake Couriers . They are a Courier company with a difference in the sense that they employ only deaf people in their organization. The whole act of delivering a courier does not ideally require the delivery man speaking. Its just Packed, Delivered and Sealed. What a beautiful company!
How much of Software Testing can we do by not being able to speak ? Can deaf people make good testers ? The more i think about it, the more i tend to believe that if we as a professionals, in order entire careers can guide and mentor the differently-abled people and help them shine, it will transition our profession from a Wonderful one to a Beautiful one.
That’s why i say the whole idea of Personal Excellence should eventually move beyond self. After one has achieved excellence, help spread it!
Signing off this blog post on this note. Do send your feedback! (Sorry for such a long post. I couldnt help but write)
The theme of this workshop as unique in many sense. It was Personal excellence & skill development . Being a part of quite a few conferences in the past, this was arguably the first workshop (or a conference) dedicated to this so relevant topic. That was exactly one of my first thoughts when i got to know about Speaking opportunity here i.e. Personal Excellence is so very important but most of the external conferences are so focused on rather external skills (Some call them Technical Skills, Some Hard skills, Some Job skills...).
In short, i knew i had to contribute to this opportunity and i chose a topic quite related and close to my experience. My topic was-
An Attempt to define Personal Excellence- Some Snippets from my experience
I have uploaded the presentation here .
This session was quite close to my heart as i chose to spoke on some experiences that i have been through in the past, which has largely helped me to shape my mind and thinking. While i need to get better at video recording my sessions but till the time i do so, i wanted to Summarize the key points of my talk here. Before you proceed, just to mention, what follows are just my thoughts on Personal Excellence, which may differs from yours. So do share your perspective.
Some Key points i presented:
- This presentation is just “An attempt to define Personal Excellence…” rather than a definite guide to Personal Excellence as i am no definite authority on Personal Excellence.
Essence of Personal Excellence: This dialog from the movie
3 Idiots define the essence of Personal Excellence for me
Kisi Mahapurush ne kaha hai, success ke pichhe mat bhago. Excellence! Excellence ka pichha karo. Kamyabi jhakkh mar ke tumhare pichhe aayegi. (Some wise soul has told that, don’t run after success. Excellence! Follow and conquer Excellence! Post which success will just come running at your door steps.)
I believe most of the answers regarding Personal Excellence reside inside us rather than outside.
Reading shapes your mind One of the quotes that i found Inspirational is-
If you read for just half an hour everyday, you could finish a 250 page book in just two weeks' time. That's twenty six books a year. A hundred books in next four years.
To learn and grow, make reading (books that make you better) your religion. Just think, what difference would that make to the quality of your mind, your career, your life ?
Habit of reading in itself cannot change you unless you have the necessary will: One of my learnings have been that Reading books or Reading quotes in itself cannot Change you. These acts or habits are powerless in a way as in the mere act of reading alone cannot change you. At the most what it can do is to Inspire you. Unless one matches that Inspiration with will and Inspiration to bring you that positive change you wanted, the whole act of Reading may not be that fruitful in the end.
- With the advent of Globalization and the adoption of
Employees first culture, More than ever in the history of human kind, there is now an unrelenting focus on people and Individual Excellence and Organizations are beginning to understand the same.
Personal Excellence=Excellence in various Life situations: I find Personal Excellence very closely associated with how one deals with different situations you find yourself in. Most of us generally gets to deal with myriad of situations when executing our professions. Some can be easy, Some will be tough for sure. Its actually how one gets to handle the different situations defines the level of success one enjoys. You can either be faced with a tough boss or tough colleague, or with a situation of people around you being fired, or even the situation of having to convey a bad news (as a testers we are often) or even the situation of having promoted, there can be numerous such situations.
Shane Warne once said-
Never worry about the situation you are in because that is already upon you. Instead ask yourself how can you win from here.
An uncluttered mind and an ability to think on feet are important when dealing with situations specific to Conveying the bad news (last minute bugs, not so pleasant news about Product Quality etc.) as there can be a lot of unexpected conversations during these situations. Preparing for worse is a wise move but keeping your mind clouded with worse happening doesnt help. As Michael Fox once said- "Never think too much about the worse for it may never happens. If you keep thinking about the worse and Even if it happens by chance, you would have lived it twice.".
Handling Disappointments: The Unexpected conversations in the above situations can also lead to disappointments. Handling disappointments successfully is as important as handling the successes in one's career.
I found Don Shula's twenty-four hour rule quite relevant in managing disappointments at workplace. As Don Shula says-
I had a twenty-four hour rule. I allowed myself, my coaches, and our players a maximum of twenty-four hours after football game to celebrate a victory or bemoan a defeat. During that time, everyone was encouraged to experience the thrill of victory or the agony of defeat as deeply as possible, while learning as much as we could from that same experience. Once the twenty-four hour deadline had passed, we put it behind us and focused our energies on preparing for next opponent.
Difference between "Commitment" and "Interest"
For managing multiple tasks and passions at work and in life in general, it is important to be able to distinguish between the tasks you are merely interested in as against the tasks you are truly committed for. As Ken Blanchard says in his book "The Heart of a Leader"
I learned from author and consultant Art Turock that we need to make a distinction between being interested and being committed. When you are "interested" in doing something, you only do it when its convenient, but when you are "committed", you follow through no matter what, no excuse."
Managing time and priorities Another aspect that i find quite relevant in managing multiple tasks and passions is Effective time management and effort prioritization. I have learned that managing time well is more about managing yourself well so that you can make most of the time.
Subroto Bagchi in his book- “The Professional” mentions-
It is probably more effective to watch and learn from people who actually seem to manage their time well, and who feel productive and satisfied. My experience of meeting many such people and working with them tells me the primary quality they all have is self-discipline. If someone does not have basic self-discipline, you will soon find that poor time management is just one of their many problems.
On Prioritization-
The issue some people face is not the absence of a goal, whether big or small. The issue is their multiplicity. For people with resources, it is the lack of prioritization that becomes a big problem . It is important to prioritize one’s life. Ask what is really important to you. Also ask why this thing is so important and are you willing to commit yourself completely to it.
The prioritization of work is more often as simple as having discipline to put down all your tasks on a paper or document and number them in order of execution. Simple. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Setting your own benchmarks: Most people benchmark their progress with the number of promotions one gets and after how long. This may be a right benchmark depending upon your goals and aspirations but more often this is typically done to keep up with rather false societal norms. It is important to set own benchmarks for self and work towards having a body of work that you can be proud of and remembered for. Getting promoted alone may not be the best benchmark for one's career. It is not always a true measure of excellence in job.
The need to Initiate, Getting Started: In our work places, how many ideas (initiated by others or self) do we reject everyday either by saying or within our minds thinking they are worthless? How many times we get scared to ask a question in a large gathering thinking that people will ridicule even a single slip of tongue? How many times our own self stops us from trying something new just because that very something new will break the routine way of doing things ? I salute you if you answer "None" to any or all of these questions. But the fact of matter is that in most of the situations, without realizing, we fail to initiate. Many ideas die a silent death just because they are not allowed to come out, Just because we don’t get started. As Seth Godin says in his book- "Poke the Box"
The essence of human is to get started
So for a change raise your hand to take up an initiative you have no knowledge about. That very act will make you better than those who have knowledge but no will to get started. Any Knowledge and Skill can be attained much faster than you can imagine, it is often the willingness to get started that separates Achievers from Average employees, from Dispensable to indispensable employees.
How well do we ask for feedback often separates how much better do we get ? Paul Arden in his book- Whatever you think, think the opposite says-
Ask for a Slap in the face.
Let me explain- if you ask someone your piece of work and you ask them “What do you think ?”, they will probably say its ok because they don’t want to offend you. Next time, instead of asking what is right, ask for What is wrong in this piece of work ? This question usually changes the equation a bit. They may not say what you want to hear but the chances are that they will give you a truthful criticism. Truth hurts but in a long run it is better than a pat on the back.
What’s your definition of "Done" and how Religiously do you follow it ?
When someone says I have Done something, how would you know that something is really Done.
As Subroto Bagchi says beautifully in his book “The Professional”-
"The quality to do what you have said you will do, in the time you have committed to must be applied to the smallest of tasks in your life. Without it, you not only disrespect others, you disrespect yourself."
- The Final point i made in the presentation was that The very idea of Personal Excellence goes beyond self. This may sound contradictory to what i mentioned in the beginning but i believe that the whole notion of Personal Excellence can sometimes (and often) make ourselves very Selfish. After all, by its very nature, Personal Excellence is close to you. I was reading this interesting story of Mirake Couriers . They are a Courier company with a difference in the sense that they employ only deaf people in their organization. The whole act of delivering a courier does not ideally require the delivery man speaking. Its just Packed, Delivered and Sealed. What a beautiful company!
How much of Software Testing can we do by not being able to speak ? Can deaf people make good testers ? The more i think about it, the more i tend to believe that if we as a professionals, in order entire careers can guide and mentor the differently-abled people and help them shine, it will transition our profession from a Wonderful one to a Beautiful one.
That’s why i say the whole idea of Personal Excellence should eventually move beyond self. After one has achieved excellence, help spread it!
Signing off this blog post on this note. Do send your feedback! (Sorry for such a long post. I couldnt help but write)
Friday, July 29, 2011
Presented a Corporate Techtalk on Globalization Testing
Earlier in the month of July, i was involved in presenting a TechTalk at Aditi Technologies in Bangalore. The TechTalk was on the topic- "Uncovering myths around Globalization Testing".
This talk was as a result of Invitation by one of the Testing community members Ravisuriya . Thank you Ravisuriya.
The presentation for this talk can be found here .
The overall Presentation setup was good and there were quite a few questions in the end about the topic discussed. One of the questions that caught my attention was-
"Is it possible to eliminate Globalization testing altogether?”
Although as a passionate professional, i may be biased in my views and opinions around this but this one is good to think further and investigate. I did respond with a "No" with some reasons around external dependencies and Product architecture and lot of other variable factors but this one certainly deserves a little bit more thought.
There was one more good question on what is the right ratio of Globalization testing vs English Testing.
I would write about my perspective to these questions sometime soon.
This talk was as a result of Invitation by one of the Testing community members Ravisuriya . Thank you Ravisuriya.
The presentation for this talk can be found here .
The overall Presentation setup was good and there were quite a few questions in the end about the topic discussed. One of the questions that caught my attention was-
"Is it possible to eliminate Globalization testing altogether?”
Although as a passionate professional, i may be biased in my views and opinions around this but this one is good to think further and investigate. I did respond with a "No" with some reasons around external dependencies and Product architecture and lot of other variable factors but this one certainly deserves a little bit more thought.
There was one more good question on what is the right ratio of Globalization testing vs English Testing.
I would write about my perspective to these questions sometime soon.
Sunday, July 24, 2011
One Effective way to learn about Software Globalization Engineering
If you want to Learn about Software Globalization Engineering, one of the practical tools that i have come across is "World Ready Software Example", which can be found here .
Originally designed to support only Windows 2000 and Windows XP, this tool actually works on Windows 7 to a good extent. You can actually try out several features of a fully Globalized application.
What can you do with this tool ?
- You can check the Local formats like Date, Time, Currency, Calendar, Numbers from the loads of different locales.
- You can input any Unicode characters and see how a truly Globalized application processes the characters,\.
- You can check the Multilingual User Interface feature and change the current language to any listed language at the run-time.
- You can simulate Pseudo Translation.
- You can simulate Pseudo Mirroring. Mirroring is the process of simulating the RTL (Right-to-Left languages like Arabic etc.).
- And much more.
How does this tool look like ?
Originally designed to support only Windows 2000 and Windows XP, this tool actually works on Windows 7 to a good extent. You can actually try out several features of a fully Globalized application.
What can you do with this tool ?
- You can check the Local formats like Date, Time, Currency, Calendar, Numbers from the loads of different locales.
- You can input any Unicode characters and see how a truly Globalized application processes the characters,\.
- You can check the Multilingual User Interface feature and change the current language to any listed language at the run-time.
- You can simulate Pseudo Translation.
- You can simulate Pseudo Mirroring. Mirroring is the process of simulating the RTL (Right-to-Left languages like Arabic etc.).
- And much more.
How does this tool look like ?
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Presented at the SofTec 2011 Software Testing Conference
I am back and on the time that i promised. Breaks are always good and this one was no different.
I got the invitation to present at Silicon India's SofTec 2011 Software Testing Conference and completed my presentation yesterday. The stage was not new for me having presented in 2010 edition as well(on the same stage). When i got the call to present at the conference, i had in mind to speak about Cloud phenomenon for some reasons-
- In 2010, i presented on "Globalization Testing- Getting your Software World Ready". This year it had to be different.
- Cloud is more of an in-phenomenon and more relevant to talk about in the Conference.
- I had developed a fascination for the similar topic earlier this year and thought i could build upon that.
Summary of my talk:
So my Topic for SofTec 2011 was- "The Emergence of Cloud Computing and Software Testing- A Perspective". I primarily talked broadly on the following areas-
- Importance of Learning by Association.
- Associating the origin of Cloud computing with the Advent of Electricity.
- Basics of Cloud computing including Grid and Utility computing.
- Covering the business models around Cloud Computing- including IaaS, PaaS, SaaS.
- The inter-relation between Cloud Computing and Software Testing.
- What are the different ways Testing could be moved on to the cloud- Public cloud, Private Cloud, Hybrid clouds.
- Explaining the Fundamental shift from the testers owning Physical machines to test Software applications traditionally to now testers owning raw computing power. All this made possible with Virtualization.
- How could Cloud's elasticity be used effectively in Software testing ?
- How does cloud amount to Green Software Testing ?
- How can Snapshot features help the Software Testing ?
- How is the Virtual lab automation make Software Testing effective ?
- Then i discussed some Live examples primarily featuring-
- Test Management on the Cloud.
- Test data generation on the Cloud.
- On demand usability testing using Cloud.
- Mobile handset testing
- Blogging
- Followed by presentation around the Security and Availability concerns around Cloud and some perspectives around that.
Question and Answers:
Overall it went good and flawless to an extent. Post presentation there were quite a few offline questions. One of the Intriguing questions from a participant was- "When i use Virtual test environment, i am not seeing some of issues that my customers are seeing on the Physical hardware". Upon Investigation, it appeared that the code base of application under test was more than a decade old and that might have some dependency on the results that were seen/not seen. However, i will be exploring this question in a bit more detail and would like to blog about the same in the near future.
Other Interesting Sessions:
I liked the Panel talk involving Quality heads of Companies such as Tata Global Beverages, BIOCON, Mahindra Reva Electric Vehicles, and moderated by T.Ashok from STAG Software. This was one of the unique session in which people from Non-Software fields discussed their experiences around Testing as it relates to their Industries. I am surprised (having attended many conferences) nobody thought of engaging such a panel in the past. The discussions were enriching and most of the non-software people agreed to the fact that there is much more focus on prevention than defect detection as is the case with most of Software Testing. Also, there was stringent focus on Design and testing the Design itself. Reliability testing takes altogether a new dimension as the representative from Reva Electric car rightly said- "Software can afford to crash and hang but cars cant"
I quite liked the session "Software Fault Patterns – A Narrative from the Operation Theatre " by Dr. Sukanta Bhatt. His presentation style is unique and hilarious. Again, he stressed the importance of Accuracy, UI design, and understanding the perspective of On field Doctors. He really made audience laugh and drove home the point that Software Testing career cannot be considered complete unless one has a real life experience of testing a Medical Software. Period.
Overall a great experience. Time permitting, i really wish to record the video of the presentation and put in on Youtube sometime.
I got the invitation to present at Silicon India's SofTec 2011 Software Testing Conference and completed my presentation yesterday. The stage was not new for me having presented in 2010 edition as well(on the same stage). When i got the call to present at the conference, i had in mind to speak about Cloud phenomenon for some reasons-
- In 2010, i presented on "Globalization Testing- Getting your Software World Ready". This year it had to be different.
- Cloud is more of an in-phenomenon and more relevant to talk about in the Conference.
- I had developed a fascination for the similar topic earlier this year and thought i could build upon that.
Summary of my talk:
So my Topic for SofTec 2011 was- "The Emergence of Cloud Computing and Software Testing- A Perspective". I primarily talked broadly on the following areas-
- Importance of Learning by Association.
- Associating the origin of Cloud computing with the Advent of Electricity.
- Basics of Cloud computing including Grid and Utility computing.
- Covering the business models around Cloud Computing- including IaaS, PaaS, SaaS.
- The inter-relation between Cloud Computing and Software Testing.
- What are the different ways Testing could be moved on to the cloud- Public cloud, Private Cloud, Hybrid clouds.
- Explaining the Fundamental shift from the testers owning Physical machines to test Software applications traditionally to now testers owning raw computing power. All this made possible with Virtualization.
- How could Cloud's elasticity be used effectively in Software testing ?
- How does cloud amount to Green Software Testing ?
- How can Snapshot features help the Software Testing ?
- How is the Virtual lab automation make Software Testing effective ?
- Then i discussed some Live examples primarily featuring-
- Test Management on the Cloud.
- Test data generation on the Cloud.
- On demand usability testing using Cloud.
- Mobile handset testing
- Blogging
- Followed by presentation around the Security and Availability concerns around Cloud and some perspectives around that.
Question and Answers:
Overall it went good and flawless to an extent. Post presentation there were quite a few offline questions. One of the Intriguing questions from a participant was- "When i use Virtual test environment, i am not seeing some of issues that my customers are seeing on the Physical hardware". Upon Investigation, it appeared that the code base of application under test was more than a decade old and that might have some dependency on the results that were seen/not seen. However, i will be exploring this question in a bit more detail and would like to blog about the same in the near future.
Other Interesting Sessions:
I liked the Panel talk involving Quality heads of Companies such as Tata Global Beverages, BIOCON, Mahindra Reva Electric Vehicles, and moderated by T.Ashok from STAG Software. This was one of the unique session in which people from Non-Software fields discussed their experiences around Testing as it relates to their Industries. I am surprised (having attended many conferences) nobody thought of engaging such a panel in the past. The discussions were enriching and most of the non-software people agreed to the fact that there is much more focus on prevention than defect detection as is the case with most of Software Testing. Also, there was stringent focus on Design and testing the Design itself. Reliability testing takes altogether a new dimension as the representative from Reva Electric car rightly said- "Software can afford to crash and hang but cars cant"
I quite liked the session "Software Fault Patterns – A Narrative from the Operation Theatre " by Dr. Sukanta Bhatt. His presentation style is unique and hilarious. Again, he stressed the importance of Accuracy, UI design, and understanding the perspective of On field Doctors. He really made audience laugh and drove home the point that Software Testing career cannot be considered complete unless one has a real life experience of testing a Medical Software. Period.
Overall a great experience. Time permitting, i really wish to record the video of the presentation and put in on Youtube sometime.
Monday, May 16, 2011
I will be back
I started blogging more than 3 and half years back. Since the time i wrote up that first post of mine, it’s been a constant endeavour from my side to come up with a quality post for my readers sharing my experiences and insights in Software Testing primarily, Management, Life skills and much more. I can assure you that each of the post that i wrote went through a lot of creative cycles and eventually got submitted. Some turned out good, some average and some bad. Some had a lot of comments, some few and some none. It’s actually a part of being a blogger and a writer. Bottom line is that i have been passionate about Software Testing and Writing and that’s what has been naturally driving this blog.
More than three years is a long time and with mind always looking to churn out some remarkable content to write, it can get challenging. I have decided to take a little break from blogging. I always believe that taking downtime is Important in life, be it your work life or even including anything that you love so much doing. This blog and my other interests comes almost as a second nature to me, So it’s quite hard not contributing here, even though briefly. In my experience, sometimes taking a step back often works wonders in your journey forward in a long run.
So Please don’t be disheartened if you don’t see a new content in this blog for a while. In all fairness to my readers, i should be back by or before end of July 2011.
I would be encouraged to see what you feel/think about this blog and also what do you want me to write on. Please do share your thoughts around these.
More than three years is a long time and with mind always looking to churn out some remarkable content to write, it can get challenging. I have decided to take a little break from blogging. I always believe that taking downtime is Important in life, be it your work life or even including anything that you love so much doing. This blog and my other interests comes almost as a second nature to me, So it’s quite hard not contributing here, even though briefly. In my experience, sometimes taking a step back often works wonders in your journey forward in a long run.
So Please don’t be disheartened if you don’t see a new content in this blog for a while. In all fairness to my readers, i should be back by or before end of July 2011.
I would be encouraged to see what you feel/think about this blog and also what do you want me to write on. Please do share your thoughts around these.
Friday, April 29, 2011
Of being a Self starter, Receiving Feedback, Mentorship and Michelangelo
I was recently reading thbe book- The Habit of Winning by Prakash Iyer and came across this story
The great painter and sculptor Michelangelo has several masterpieces to his credit. Perhaps at the top of that list is "David", his eighteen-foot-tall statue sculpted in marble in Florence, Italy. Now over 500 years old, this icon of Renaissance sculpture continues to attract- and fascinate- millions of visitors every year, from all over the world. Everyone who sees it goes back impressed by the genius of Michelangelo. But I am not sure if they all also take back the story behind the sculpting of this masterpiece.
The story goes that this mammoth eighteen-foot block of marble had been lying around for several years. In fact, it had been around long before Michelangelo was even born. Some great artists, including Leonardo da Vinci, were invited to create something from the slab of marble. They all looked at it and dismissed it as flawed and worthless. Nothing could come of it, they felt. Several years later, Michelangelo got to work on that 'flawed and worthless' piece of marble, and went on to create a magnificent work of art. Apparently, while he was working on David, a little boy went up to Michelangelo and asked him why he was banging away at the rock of marble, and hitting it so hard. 'Young man,' said Michelangelo. "There's an angel inside that rock. I am just setting him free.".
I did quite relate to this story as this tale is full of powerful lessons that we could apply in our Professional and Personal lives. Some of them below-
Power of Getting Started:
Before Michelangelo many renowned artists were called upon to give shape and life to this rough slab of marble but most of them dismissed the same as worthless even without thinking to try. Beyond all the artistic talent that Michelangelo had, he had a special quality i.e. the Power to initiate, that innate desire to start something.
In our work places, how many ideas (initiated by others or self) do we reject everyday either by saying or within our minds thinking they are worthless? How many times we get scared to ask a question in a large gathering thinking that people will ridicule even a single slip of tongue? How many times our own self stops us from trying something new just because that very something new will break the routine way of doing things ? I salute you if you answer "None" to any or all of these questions. But the fact of matter is that in most of the situations, without realizing, we fail to initiate. Many ideas die a silent death just because they are not allowed to come out, Just because we don’t get started.
I was reading this interesting article on How to measure Initiative ? . Found some great wisdom against which one can measure self on Initiative scale. It talks of following Stages-
1. Wait- People don’t initiate anything from self but keep waiting for Instructions.
2. Ask- Instead of Indefinitely waiting, you Ask your superior to involve you in something of meaning to you.
3. Recommend- This stage is more of not only "just" asking but also Recommending what interests you and the direction in which you would like to proceed.
4. Act Independently but Report Immediately- Think of an Action, Get convinced that it is right for business and take it immediately and report it back to Superior. This is mostly for areas you are delving into for the first time and building trust with your superior.
5. Act Independently and Report routinely- This is a stage when you are completely Independent and has been initiating lot of stuff from your side.
The story doesn’t tell whether Michelangelo had any boss but we certainly do have one. That’s why the above framework helps you know where you stand on an Initiative scale.
As Seth Godin says in his book Poke the Box , The challenge, it turns out, isn’t in perfecting your ability to know when to start and when to stand by. The challenge is getting into the habit of starting.
Start early, Start without someone prompting you- And become Michelangelo of your craft!
Mentorship:
When Michelangelo says those magical words- "There's an angel inside that rock ? I am just setting him free.", what is he actually doing to that rock. In some sense, he is acting as a Mentor to that Rock, chiselling it, correcting it and giving it a World class shape. Without googling for it, if i have to define a Mentor, he or she is someone who shapes your mind towards success in any undertaking. Mentor helps correct your flaws not even when going is rough but even stands to influence you even during normal conversations.
I always feel having a good mentor more important than being in the Influence of good books. It only helps to open up and look for mentor and create a stage for yourself to be a mentor to someone.
Receiving Feedback:
Another learning i gather from this story is that if the Rock was rigid, it would never have transformed into David. Likewise, if we as humans are rigid in receiving feedback, we would turn into a Rock that could never be moulded. Receiving feedback is as much as a skill as is relaying feedback. Hearing a negative feedback about self is sometimes as painful as Rock (if it was living) that Michelangelo chiselled. The ones who absorb this pain becomes better and eventually World class.
Do you have any more learnings from this Story ?
The great painter and sculptor Michelangelo has several masterpieces to his credit. Perhaps at the top of that list is "David", his eighteen-foot-tall statue sculpted in marble in Florence, Italy. Now over 500 years old, this icon of Renaissance sculpture continues to attract- and fascinate- millions of visitors every year, from all over the world. Everyone who sees it goes back impressed by the genius of Michelangelo. But I am not sure if they all also take back the story behind the sculpting of this masterpiece.
The story goes that this mammoth eighteen-foot block of marble had been lying around for several years. In fact, it had been around long before Michelangelo was even born. Some great artists, including Leonardo da Vinci, were invited to create something from the slab of marble. They all looked at it and dismissed it as flawed and worthless. Nothing could come of it, they felt. Several years later, Michelangelo got to work on that 'flawed and worthless' piece of marble, and went on to create a magnificent work of art. Apparently, while he was working on David, a little boy went up to Michelangelo and asked him why he was banging away at the rock of marble, and hitting it so hard. 'Young man,' said Michelangelo. "There's an angel inside that rock. I am just setting him free.".
I did quite relate to this story as this tale is full of powerful lessons that we could apply in our Professional and Personal lives. Some of them below-
Power of Getting Started:
Before Michelangelo many renowned artists were called upon to give shape and life to this rough slab of marble but most of them dismissed the same as worthless even without thinking to try. Beyond all the artistic talent that Michelangelo had, he had a special quality i.e. the Power to initiate, that innate desire to start something.
In our work places, how many ideas (initiated by others or self) do we reject everyday either by saying or within our minds thinking they are worthless? How many times we get scared to ask a question in a large gathering thinking that people will ridicule even a single slip of tongue? How many times our own self stops us from trying something new just because that very something new will break the routine way of doing things ? I salute you if you answer "None" to any or all of these questions. But the fact of matter is that in most of the situations, without realizing, we fail to initiate. Many ideas die a silent death just because they are not allowed to come out, Just because we don’t get started.
I was reading this interesting article on How to measure Initiative ? . Found some great wisdom against which one can measure self on Initiative scale. It talks of following Stages-
1. Wait- People don’t initiate anything from self but keep waiting for Instructions.
2. Ask- Instead of Indefinitely waiting, you Ask your superior to involve you in something of meaning to you.
3. Recommend- This stage is more of not only "just" asking but also Recommending what interests you and the direction in which you would like to proceed.
4. Act Independently but Report Immediately- Think of an Action, Get convinced that it is right for business and take it immediately and report it back to Superior. This is mostly for areas you are delving into for the first time and building trust with your superior.
5. Act Independently and Report routinely- This is a stage when you are completely Independent and has been initiating lot of stuff from your side.
The story doesn’t tell whether Michelangelo had any boss but we certainly do have one. That’s why the above framework helps you know where you stand on an Initiative scale.
As Seth Godin says in his book Poke the Box , The challenge, it turns out, isn’t in perfecting your ability to know when to start and when to stand by. The challenge is getting into the habit of starting.
Start early, Start without someone prompting you- And become Michelangelo of your craft!
Mentorship:
When Michelangelo says those magical words- "There's an angel inside that rock ? I am just setting him free.", what is he actually doing to that rock. In some sense, he is acting as a Mentor to that Rock, chiselling it, correcting it and giving it a World class shape. Without googling for it, if i have to define a Mentor, he or she is someone who shapes your mind towards success in any undertaking. Mentor helps correct your flaws not even when going is rough but even stands to influence you even during normal conversations.
I always feel having a good mentor more important than being in the Influence of good books. It only helps to open up and look for mentor and create a stage for yourself to be a mentor to someone.
Receiving Feedback:
Another learning i gather from this story is that if the Rock was rigid, it would never have transformed into David. Likewise, if we as humans are rigid in receiving feedback, we would turn into a Rock that could never be moulded. Receiving feedback is as much as a skill as is relaying feedback. Hearing a negative feedback about self is sometimes as painful as Rock (if it was living) that Michelangelo chiselled. The ones who absorb this pain becomes better and eventually World class.
Do you have any more learnings from this Story ?
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