temporary links to the: blog + feed

(wiki addicts know this surely: while writing this Wordpress post - I instinctively wrote the links between [ ] )

possible dis-/advantages:
Hugh Mackay - We like to think we’re ‘wired’. But, really, we’re just plain weird

how did I come here ? (or in other words: interesting how the brain works sometimes)
- I read a book about software quality - after finishing chapter 1 (ideas/definitions about quality), I thought of an old post by James

Guess what I will do around that time

more info
- [Python-Dev] 3.0.1/3.1.0 summary
- Google calendar: Python Release Schedule

- Python would not build because of missing tkinter + a problem with dbm
- I had two freezes of Pardus 2008.2 Canis aureus with the new KDE 4.2.0 (not sure yet, what caused this - one was during the “make test” - I hope my HD is still ok)
- the “make test”

But it works now - the first Hello world in new syntax:

./python3.0
Python 3.0 (r30:67503, Feb 1 2009, 21:41:15)
[GCC 4.3.2] on linux2
Type “help”, “copyright”, “credits” or “license” for more information.

>>> print(’Hello world’)
Hello world
[34091 refs]

>>> print ‘now with an error’
File ““, line 1
print ‘now with an error’
^
SyntaxError: invalid syntax
[34128 refs]

>>> import os
[34076 refs]
>>> print (os.name)
posix
[34093 refs]
>>> dir(os)
[’EX_CANTCREAT’, ‘EX_CONFIG’, ‘EX_DATAERR’, ‘EX_IOERR’, ‘EX_NOHOST’, ‘EX_NOINPUT’, ‘EX_NOPERM’, ‘EX_NOUSER’, ‘EX_OK’, ‘EX_OSERR’, ‘EX_OSFILE’, ‘EX_PROTOCOL’, ‘EX_SOFTWARE’, ‘EX_TEMPFAIL’, ‘EX_UNAVAILABLE’, ‘EX_USAGE’, ‘F_OK’, ‘MutableMapping’, ‘NGROUPS_MAX’, ‘O_APPEND’, ‘O_ASYNC’, ‘O_CREAT’, ‘O_DIRECT’, ‘O_DIRECTORY’, ‘O_DSYNC’, ‘O_EXCL’, ‘O_LARGEFILE’, ‘O_NDELAY’, ‘O_NOATIME’, ‘O_NOCTTY’, ‘O_NOFOLLOW’, ‘O_NONBLOCK’, ‘O_RDONLY’, ‘O_RDWR’, ‘O_RSYNC’, ‘O_SYNC’, ‘O_TRUNC’, ‘O_WRONLY’, ‘P_NOWAIT’, ‘P_NOWAITO’, ‘P_WAIT’, ‘R_OK’, ‘SEEK_CUR’, ‘SEEK_END’, ‘SEEK_SET’, ‘TMP_MAX’, ‘WCONTINUED’, ‘WCOREDUMP’, ‘WEXITSTATUS’, ‘WIFCONTINUED’, ‘WIFEXITED’, ‘WIFSIGNALED’, ‘WIFSTOPPED’, ‘WNOHANG’, ‘WSTOPSIG’, ‘WTERMSIG’, ‘WUNTRACED’, ‘W_OK’, ‘X_OK’, ‘_Environ’, ‘__all__’, ‘__builtins__’, ‘__doc__’, ‘__file__’, ‘__name__’, ‘__package__’, ‘_copyreg’, ‘_execvpe’, ‘_exists’, ‘_exit’, ‘_get_exports_list’, ‘_keymap’, ‘_make_stat_result’, ‘_make_statvfs_result’, ‘_pickle_stat_result’, ‘_pickle_statvfs_result’, ‘_putenv’, ‘_spawnvef’, ‘_unsetenv’, ‘_wrap_close’, ‘abort’, ‘access’, ‘altsep’, ‘chdir’, ‘chmod’, ‘chown’, ‘chroot’, ‘close’, ‘closerange’, ‘confstr’, ‘confstr_names’, ‘ctermid’, ‘curdir’, ‘defpath’, ‘device_encoding’, ‘devnull’, ‘dup’, ‘dup2′, ‘environ’, ‘errno’, ‘error’, ‘execl’, ‘execle’, ‘execlp’, ‘execlpe’, ‘execv’, ‘execve’, ‘execvp’, ‘execvpe’, ‘fchdir’, ‘fchmod’, ‘fchown’, ‘fdatasync’, ‘fdopen’, ‘fork’, ‘forkpty’, ‘fpathconf’, ‘fstat’, ‘fstatvfs’, ‘fsync’, ‘ftruncate’, ‘getcwd’, ‘getcwdb’, ‘getegid’, ‘getenv’, ‘geteuid’, ‘getgid’, ‘getgroups’, ‘getloadavg’, ‘getlogin’, ‘getpgid’, ‘getpgrp’, ‘getpid’, ‘getppid’, ‘getsid’, ‘getuid’, ‘isatty’, ‘kill’, ‘killpg’, ‘lchown’, ‘linesep’, ‘link’, ‘listdir’, ‘lseek’, ‘lstat’, ‘major’, ‘makedev’, ‘makedirs’, ‘minor’, ‘mkdir’, ‘mkfifo’, ‘mknod’, ‘name’, ‘nice’, ‘open’, ‘openpty’, ‘pardir’, ‘path’, ‘pathconf’, ‘pathconf_names’, ‘pathsep’, ‘pipe’, ‘popen’, ‘putenv’, ‘read’, ‘readlink’, ‘remove’, ‘removedirs’, ‘rename’, ‘renames’, ‘rmdir’, ’sep’, ’setegid’, ’seteuid’, ’setgid’, ’setgroups’, ’setpgid’, ’setpgrp’, ’setregid’, ’setreuid’, ’setsid’, ’setuid’, ’spawnl’, ’spawnle’, ’spawnlp’, ’spawnlpe’,’spawnv’, ’spawnve’, ’spawnvp’, ’spawnvpe’, ’stat’, ’stat_float_times’, ’stat_result’, ’statvfs’, ’statvfs_result’, ’strerror’, ’symlink’, ’sys’, ’sysconf’, ’sysconf_names’, ’system’, ‘tcgetpgrp’, ‘tcsetpgrp’, ‘times’, ‘ttyname’, ‘umask’, ‘uname’, ‘unlink’, ‘unsetenv’, ‘urandom’, ‘utime’, ‘wait’, ‘wait3′, ‘wait4′, ‘waitpid’, ‘walk’, ‘write’]
[34322 refs]

a short glimpse with the help of Python Call Graph

application	version	without std lib	with std lib
package-manager	1.4.0
firewall-config	2.0.4
kaptan	3.5.4
user-manager	2.2
network-manager	2.1.6
network-applet	0.5
service-manager	2.0.3
pm-install	0.0.1
display-manager	0.3.7
boot-manager	1.0.1
history-manager	0.1.1
migration	0.8.5
migration-users	0

Pardus 2008.2 RC2
KDE 3.5.10
Qt: 3.3.8b
Python Call Graph 0.5.1
Python 2.5.4 (r254:67916, Jan 19 2009, 11:26:32)

What does one expect, nothing comes for free in life - especially since the test tools are not originally supported for Pardus. But support from #ldtp (and as has been previously in #dogtail) left a very positive impression.

More gui test tools which use at-spi you can find here. Here is a table which compares dogtail and ldtp. Todo: try out strongwind. In any case in your exploration install also accerciser.

ldtp 1.4.0
Pardus 2008.2 Canis aureus
Gnome 2.22.3

P.S. after showing this post in #ldtp to Nagappan Alagappan he already asked that I send him the script for further analysis. Very positive impression. Yesterday also: when I came with this unsupported Linux distro, he asked for a virtual image to try himself, debugged with me, so that we got ldtpeditor running. Keep up the good work !

After viewing the videos of dogtail this called for a test drive. On Pardus: so far dogtail’s framework can be used, but the GUI test features do not work right from the start

1. Unfortunately Pardus seems not yet included as target platform:
import distro
File “/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages/dogtail/distro.py”, line 320, in
distro = detectDistro()
File “/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages/dogtail/distro.py”, line 316, in detectDistro
raise DistributionNotSupportedError(”Unknown”)
DistributionNotSupportedError: unprintable DistributionNotSupportedError object>

Would be great if Pardus gets added to the list such as: Suse, Fedora, Redhat, Ubuntu, Debian, Gentoo, Slackware, Solaris.

2. The other problem was that the same user could not log into Gnome anymore when assistive technologies (in Gnome/Pardus) was activated. Using at-spi version 1.24.0 helped here.

Below you see the script recorder which recorded as Python code the start of Pardus’ package manager:

It would be great if an OS which is based mostly on Python can integrate more Python testing tools right from the start. Let’s see if there is some further progress with at-spi and kde. Worth a look: for KDE testing tools, more testing tools in python

Thanks again Zack Cerza for your help in #dogtail,
Erkan

dogtail 0.6.90
Pardus 2008.2 rc2
Gnome 2.22.3

I think I will start with the German WP articles first and read then the English ones - I guess with this I can help also WP: optimize both articles perhaps, at least get more info, …

Continue reading here !

you can find the 1st post here.

I am taking a break (again). At the moment I am fullfilling an old dream of mine: I am reading a book (see here) together with secondary literature.

And this demands a lot of time (looking up facts, making notes, thinking on what you just read,…)
and I must add: it makes very much fun to also read aloud during this.

From time to time - like today - I get an edgy feeling and visit some friends also online on their blogs. But for the moment I am addicted to another drug (if it is urgent call me and let’s talk about it while playing table tennis).

Erkan YILMAZ
You certainly have also an old dream or not ? Take the time and pursue the dream again. If not now, when ?

And thanks to Merlyn Albery-Speyer, Mark Anderson and Martin Clarke I know now more about Erlang (for German readers: it is not related to the German town Erlangen :-)), stapler testing and stolen blog posts. And I am sure Pradeep Soundararajan you know already from my other posts.

Erkan YILMAZ

Why am I doing this now (again) ?
Perhaps to get more of my senses activated ? Could also be because of the topic of the book - it is about ancient times. And as you know: stories sound better, when they are told.

I noticed that this slows me down (when comparing to “normal” silent reading). Could be because:
- now I read REALLY the complete text instead having read some parts (quickly)
- sometimes also the pronounciation/accentuation seems not correct to me and I stop and think how it would be correct
- perhaps I see more with my mind’s eye ?

The book has >500 pages - I wish all my neighbors fun listening

Erkan YILMAZ

So, if you didn’t buy the book yet, you missed a chance.
If you want to buy it also for your team here are some arguments to convince people who do not believe it is a book for/about testing.
You could e.g. tell them: “See how often the term test is mentioned” haha

some quotes:
- a chapter called “The Test”: “I might agree with you entirely,” smiled Akbar, “if you would agree to put them (the questions) to the test…”
- “Shall we put it to the test ?” asked Birbal
- Akbar resolved to test the shoemaker’s resilience.
- But Birbal intervened: “Jahanpanah, I think it is a fairer test if somebody is in the armor - I’ll volunteer.”
- “Can we test this ?” smiled the king.
- So Akbar had the court scholars test the stranger in every tongue.
- “… How can this be tested ?”
- “I know”, smiled Akbar. “It was the last test - so you would come out.”
- And the Emperor led everyone into the garden for the test.
- A week later in durbar, Akbar decided to test Birbal’s memory.
- “Put him to the test”, said the Begum/princess proudly.
- “You seem unconvinced”, he said to Birbal. “Very well, we shall have a test.”

Did you notice how often his majesty Akbar smiles, when he mentions test ?

book:
“A Caravan from Hindustan - the complete Birbal tales from India” by James Moseley

Erkan YILMAZ

I had played with … for two weeks and hadn’t made it crash once. Brian brought the whole thing down in three commands.
…
If only I could get a room filled with 8-year-olds to test my code.

Read Michael’s whole story here.

BTW Michael: if the mountain will not come to the prophet …
Grab your laptop with the test software and go to the next playground. I am sure any child - no matter what age - will be interested (not only because after eating ice cream typing with clammy/dirty fingers on someone elses keyboard is fun ). While doing this I would also involve mothers, grandparents and babysitters.

Erkan Yilmaz

Her mother in contrast does not believe in the mystical world:
“Fairy tales - you are a bit too old to fill your head with such nonsense” she tells Ofelia.

Well, I (Erkan) can tell: NO and I recommend you all to watch this movie.

The movie Pan’s Labyrinth (el laberinto del Fauno) starts with Faunus telling:
A long time ago, in the underground realm, where there are no lies or pain, there lived a Princess who dreamed of the human world. She dreamed of blue skies, soft breeze, and sunshine. One day, eluding her keepers, the Princess escaped. Once outside, the brightness blinded her and erased every trace of the past from her memory. She forgot who she was and where she came from. Her body suffered cold, sickness, and pain. Eventually, she died. However, her father, the King, always knew that the Princess’ soul would return, perhaps in another body, in another place, at another time. And he would wait for her, until he drew his last breath, until the world stopped turning… (from IMDB)

another quote:
person 1: You could have obeyed me!
person 2: But … to obey - just like that - for obedience’s sake… without questioning… That’s something only people like you do.

Erkan YILMAZ

… some other sweets than usual (this time I bought a 1 kg package). I hope this lasts longer and I am also curious if they like them.

People might now perhaps talk on the effects for the quality of work or other issues, but it is just nice to see their happy faces when getting some sweets.
Everybody wants sweets in some kind of way. Awake the child in others (and yourself).

What about you ?

Erkan YILMAZ

edit 17.07.2007: also get yourself one or two dices and let people dice how many sweets they will get. So you have some element of surprise. Watch how happy people get, when they see the dice numbers.
And all gets even nicer, if the person getting 12 sweets shares them with others

So, what did you do since then ?
I have decided to e.g. help these projects primarily in my free time:
ClamWin -
a free antivirus tool (with support from ClamAV)

Pardus -
a Linux distribution (includes many things, also KlamAV)
here the story how it came to this

Tell me, did you also help somewhere ? If not, why don’t you start finally ?

See you perhaps in one of the above or the other projects,
Erkan YILMAZ

Truth is … I didn’t come so far initially. At the begin of the installation my screen went black. I tried then also the different offered install options, but none of them worked
Google revealed, that some users also had this problem (more info at the end of the article). The installation could go on anyway, when adding the boot option xorg=safe.

Well, in comparison to such an error an unhandled exception might appear less dramatic:

After installation, my problem was now to set up the graphics card with a good frequency (e.g. in Windows, Mandriva to set up 75 Hz with 1152×864 is possible from start, but in Pardus I have so far only 60 Hz ). Downloading new ATI drivers could not fix this problem and the ATI Catalyst Control Center (amdccle) does not want to start at all (it loads and loads and then it decides to not show). Well, I just use for the moment 1024×768 with 85 Hz

But I will definitely investigate here more. I like this distribution and… my brother has some convincing arguments for Pardus. Perhaps I switch with him the hardware

Erkan YILMAZ

edit 2007-07-11: higher resolution: I have now 75 Hz with 1152×864 and the developers have some bug reports in Bugzilla
edit 2007-07-14: unhandled exception: is fixed now in Pardus 2007.2
edit 2007-07-18: black screen: one developer told this seems to be a driver bug. Zorg had identifed the videocard
and configured xorg.conf correctly. Either the driver can not identify the output device or it does not init correctly.

Erkan YILMAZ

How long has it been since you were busy with a really challenging book ? (please do not reply here, just answer this question for yourself truly)

Erkan YILMAZ

Here are some pictures:

I am boarding the carrousel:

ok, let’s make some speed to have fun:

hm, perhaps this was a little too much speed

ok, after that shock, let’s go for slow speed:

After it was our turn to play table tennis, we fought some hard battles against two brothers. Both are well known local heroes and aspirants for the title “table tennis professionals from Karlsruhe“: Salvatore and Giuseppe. Both are cool kids and I think we have made some new friends today.

BTW: here you see Salvatore giving Widodo a hard time

After that game: what might Widodo think?
Perhaps: “What did go wrong in that game?”

(btw: Martin and Andre also did not look well against the two - but unfortunately I have no pictures of that. In return for that I did let both brothers sweat a little.)

Erkan YILMAZ

Please mail your comments to him

Erkan YILMAZ

I have recently read Peter Pan and I am thinking about the next to be:

- Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
- The Book of One Thousand and One Nights
- Akbar and Birbal Stories

But I would use this opportunity to also get some advise by you too. Which children’s book did you like most as child ? Or which book should you read over and over again to your child ?

Erkan Yilmaz

Well, I could not let Chris learn all alone and learned with him:

Later - while interrogating him - also some other creatures showed interest in the topics: soil science, irrigation and erosion

In Germany we had a week of bad weather. And now with sun coming out - also children and animals did so. There was so much life going on: cries of children, animals of different sizes everywhere, also some nice looking ladies
I think I will relocate my learning place - then I am also away from distraction on the pc - there is nothing better than a book in the warm sun. And letting your thoughts wander while watching children play.

P.S. I hope everyone had a happy Mother’s Day.
Erkan YILMAZ

Why I am writing on this issue ?
This goes out to all software vendors: I am a potential customer who is not allowed to use the software and has to search for other ways to achieve his goal. If you want me to use your software in the future, please change some things. E.g. make a basic installer (like the REAL Alternative), so I can still succeed.
Well, it is interesting that with free software you can do what the company itself is not able to But if someting does not work then at least give me a proper dialog: in a good translated version. Read also later: “Does your customer smile when (s)he is confronted with an error? No - why not?“

I just wanted to install the Real Player 10.5 GOLD de to view a rm file. But I can not use it on Longhorn server:

I am told that users with restricted rights are not allowed to use it - and I should contact my sysadmin.

Well, Erkan then thinks: “OK, let me login as admin - who knows perhaps it is because of something weird in UAC.”
Unfortunately when I start the installer as admin, I get the same msg.

So, I assume what they really want to tell me is: that I should not use this software on Longhorn Server.

BTW:
the Freeware Real Alternative 1.52 can install on Longhorn and also plays the rm file

Unfortunately I did not find a public forum where I can look up for similar errors. Also googling did not help much.
Perhaps someone has similar experience with Vista too ? (btw: this site shows me Vista or Longhorn server is not in the supported OS list.)

Let me ask the REAL support about this. (BTW: I want to help also Real with this posting - so other users have not the same problem. Please see this all as positive feedback.)

Actually about the dialog:
1. the first sentence of the message is quite dazzling:
As user with restricted rights in the windows OS you are not allowed to use this program for installing software. (”Als Benutzer mit eingeschränkten Rechten im Windows-Betriebssystem dürfen Sie dieses Programms zur Installation von Software nicht verwenden.”)

Does it appear only for me as bad German ? I would expect such a message: As user with restricted rights in the windows OS you are not allowed to install this program. (”Als Benutzer mit eingeschränkten Rechten im Windows-Betriebssystem dürfen Sie dieses Programm nicht installieren.”)

2. there is a spelling error

My Basic System Information:
Microsoft® Windows® Server™ Code Name “Longhorn” Datacenter
6.0.6001 Service Pack 1, v.126 Build 6001
AMD Athlon Xp 1800+, 1,25 GB RAM
(more info available on request with a msinfo32 file)

Erkan YILMAZ

For the first question your answer might be: yes
If the answer for the second is also yes, I would be interested in the third answer.

With this posting I do not want to tell you about the many advantages as a tester to use open source software (practicing your skills; getting to know other, public, collaborative projects; …). No, I ONLY want to invite you to help (if I think about how many people out there could help, my head is swimming).

I am sure, if you give the open source community feedback, they will appreciate this, because:
1. it will be feedback
2. it will be (hopefully) good communicated feedback about a bug or feature

Would it cost so much for you to help ?
Don`t be a parasite - pay back ! Start here ! You can do this right now on your pc !
Use your skills for something good !

Erkan YILMAZ

I will catch up with you !
Erkan

I like the idea very much and here is now the opportunity to judge yourself.
BTW: it “… has been officially installed on all testers machines in 2 organizations in India so far.” (Pradeep Soundararajan)
needed OS: Win2K or XP

Here you can find the PPS version.

I present the not-winners of the day for this specific term (I do not use term loser with purpose):
IATE (result)
Google Translator (result) and
Babelfish (result)
(or could be said following ? IATE was so honest to tell nothing, instead telling something wrong or something which does not make sense - or does there exist a term “spiesser” in English ?)

From the results one could infer perhaps “Spießer” should be translated with “bourgeois” or “babbitt” ? But I will ask better a native English speaking person to help me out here. Perhaps someone who knows the context of the term since our recent slogan game

Erkan YILMAZ

btw: why do I post about such things ?
- to help Michael and others to assess the quality of online translation services
- I am curious and might gain some interesting info (e.g. do some services use the same database: Beolingus and ergo4u; Google Translator and Babelfish ?)
- you never know where and when you can see a bug. E.g. is the behaviour of Google translator and Babelfish wrong ?
a. From my point of view: yes.
BUT: “A bug is anything about the product that threatens its value. And: Quality is value to some person (who matters).” (James Bach and Michael Bolton, Rapid Software Testing, slide 12, slide version 2.1.3)
And I am not sure, if I matter at Google
So far, I am not quite sure, if there exists really such an English term “spiesser”. So let me ask someone, because I do not know (also: cost value factor of asking a native English speaking person is better than me now doing a search - well: it is also a little late - I hope you excuse me for that). Let’s see what I can investigate afterwards.
b. From your point of view: ?

edit 2007 May 04:
I got a ping and “square” seems the best translation (when used to refer to a person)
and this would make LEO the winner of the day

edit 2007 August 21:
there is an updated graphic available - which includes also dict.cc and woerterbuch.info - see here

And ? Where is the relevance to testing ?
Well, do you agree, that during testing we arrive at situations where we do not have always every info ? Why is this ?

One explanation could be:
Information transmits faster, if there is included pictures/sound or it is packed meaning into the sentences (e.g. by using proverbs, schema, concepts, categories, analogies, metaphors, associations, …).
But the problem may be, that recipients do not have access to this additional info (e.g. slogans from other countries).

So, read these slogans please. And find out if you can guess the products they advertise for (and eventually the companies) !

1. “Hey Dad, when I grow up, I also want to be square.”
2. “We wake up earlier.”
3. “We can do everything but speak Standard German.”
4. “With the second eye you see better.”
5. “Firm as a rock in the surge.”
6. “We demand and bring forward personalities.”
7. “Try it in a gentle way.”
8. “It was never so valuable as in these times.”
9. “If it makes you beautiful…”
10. “Well, is today already christmas ?”

DO NOT CONTINUE - STOP - THINK ABOUT THE SLOGANS !

the history to this post:
I read here some slogans from USA. From that there awoke the idea to collect some slogans from German speaking countries and present them to non-German people.

BTW:
- here you can find info that helps you (but for the sake of learning, click it later - if ever).
- since the target group is non German people, I will not translate this post yet into German

Erkan YILMAZ

I used my favorite service LEO first. But this did not help much (I could have worked me up from the verbs, but …). Then I used dictionary.com and I got an explanation (I hope it is the right one ):
picker-upper: something that restores one’s depleted energy or depressed spirits

I take this now as an opportunity to search the term in some of the English to German services (see also Michael’s article):
Google Translator
Babelfish
LEO
Beolingus
ego4u
PONSline
IATE
Merriam-Webster

Unfortunately all have failed in providing me a (good) translation (I searched for “picker upper” and “picker-upper” ). Also my paper dictionary from PONS with 170000 terms could not help me.
It could appear from this, the term is not so much used. Actually I can not believe this. Imagine: after a long night in the morning probably some would need a picker-upper.

So, the winner THIS TIME is dictionary.com

BTW: let me provide some associations for “picker-upper”:
coffee; a hit into your face; red bull; a kid being tortured; a pretty woman; a joke; …

Erkan YILMAZ

(this is not the books cover - I am to blame for this selection)

So, you might now think: “What has this to do with testing ?” A lot - e.g. you should always write a good bug story (to convince the developer and/or others to care especially for that important bug); mentoring new testers and increasing the learn effect; perhaps just for the fun of telling (remember how it was back then - when you lay in your bed and you listened to a story by your mother - hey, open your eyes again ) …

0. INTRODUCTION: WHAT STICKS ?
The two authors give examples of successful stories and start to analyze them. As they tell on page 15:
“There is no “formula” for a sticky idea … But sticky ideas do draw from a common set of traits, which make them more likely to succeed” (on page 21-24 they try to harden this by results from a research team).

They give a checklist for creating a successful idea - this is a
Simple Unexpected Concrete Credentialed Emotional Story

But:
of course there is a problem to this - the Curse of Knowledge (page 20: “Once we know something, we find it hard to imagine what it was like not to know it. Our knowledge has “cursed” us“).
They demonstrate this with a simple game (I will not tell you what it is - buy the book or ask me in private).

But they say there are two ways to handle this Curse of Knowledge:
- not to learn anything or
- to transform your ideas (see the checklist above)

1. SIMPLICITY:
In the first chapter they talk about Simplicity (simple = core + compact) and demonstrate this with stories/examples (buy the book and read them ).
I liked the part where they gave examples from the Army - Commander’s intent (CI), “No plan survives contact with the enemy.” (page 25). Does this awake in you old testing memories ?

For compactness they advise to pack a lot of meaning into the sentences: proverbs, schema, concepts, categories, analogies, metaphors, associations, …
this is a clever substitution and will help transmitting info faster.

As they tell the book is a complement to Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell (guess which book is on my buy list now ?).
Here you can also listen to two audio files:
interview (runtime: 40:55 mins, 18.7 MB, recorded 2007-01-09),
speech (runtime: 37:07 mins, 17 MB, recorded 2006-09-09)

I really can recommend this book !
What I personally like besides the content is, that I get to know background info on urban legends, proverbs (eventually soon also wartime rumors, conspiracy theories and jokes).

Erkan YILMAZ

Testing in my view is not limited to software testing - for me testing involves asking questions. And everybody can ask questions (not only software testers).

Here are now 5 questions, which you can answer in any length and with any statement you like. The only aim is: to get to know you more personally.

“Let the games begin…”

1. Could you tell something about your first tests ?
2. What would you like to highlight as an important thing of testing - from your personal experiences ?
3. Why is testing not trivial ?
4. What do you do after testing at work ?
5. How do you think testing will evolve in the next 13 years ?

1. Can you tell something about your first tests ?
(Please tell more than just a simple yes or no )
The best testing period was as a baby / child - unfortunately I do not remember all tests from that period.
When I think back, the first thing I remember is:
I played a doctor game with a girl in kindergarten. We were in a tent in the outside. Weather was fine. And when I wanted to approach my test object (yes, I mean the girl), our governess looked into the tent. So, I can not tell you, how this test session would have evolved.
The next one I remember is: one kid and I wanted to throw stones at each other (of course I do not know the exact reason anymore for this game You know certainly how children are.) And guess what: the other kid hit me with the stone so hard at my head, that I had to get sewed in the hospital.
And the next one: it was summer and there was planned an open air bath. Well, while the other kids wore their drawers or mini bikinis, Erkan wanted to test, how this experience would be when being naked. Here again the governess interrupted me in my tests

2. What would you like to highlight as an important thing of testing - from your personal experiences ?
You could read in books what kind of goals testing has, how you perhaps could approach to testing and various things more. Of course everybody himself/herself must decide, if reading alone is really sufficient to do good testing.

I would like to point out, that for me testing means playing with things. Do not misunderstand me - this does not mean I do not take testing for sincere. On the contrary: I truly identify myself as a tester. Testing for me involves the aspect of exploring and playing respectively. There are so many unknown things in software (and much more in life). And my opinion is, that the best way to tease more info out, is to play with it. Like a child would do - a child plays and asks so unbelievably many questions.
(The text is copied form here.)

3. Why is testing not trivial ?
There could be shown examples like …

the triangle example
Check, how many tests you can design for this simple program:

…but well, my simple argument is: try testing yourself and you will see.

4. What do you do after testing at work ?
Well, for me it does not mean I test only at work and then I stop. This is nothing that you just can stop and turn on again. A friend once told: I should not test everything and I should also enjoy things for just what they are. I am working on this bug
I will keep you informed about what I do after work here on the blog.

5. How do you think testing will evolve in the next 13 years ?
It is in our own hands how it evolves.
What I really hope is, that people do respect testing as what it is - a creative, challenging, thrilling task which makes fun. It should not be seen as a stupid task.
And we should not wait 13 years to make this happen.

6. Did you hear my voice ?
Weird, there should have been only 5 questions, ain’t ? Well, as you know, during testing there are always surprises.
So, back to the question: Did you listen to my voice on this page (you can listen really to it by clicking somewhere on this page) ?
- If not, check this page more thoroughly ! If you listened then to my audio files: why didn’t you notice this earlier ? Well, bugs or features do not tell you always, that they exist, or do they ?
- If you (of course) noticed it at beginning and listened to the audio files then: congratulations
- If you noticed it at beginning, but did not investigate more: why ? Surely there is an explanation for this.

So, it is getting late now and I throw this baton first to these German speaking blogs: Frank Westphal, Christian Günzl, Christoph, Eddie, Tom, Hans Martin Kern, Der Tester and Nico Rühlemann

Erkan YILMAZ

Erkan YILMAZ

Here you will find my test reports - actually more correct - my game reports. Now you are certainly going to ask, why I then don’t call it “test reports” ?

Well, I want to show with this, that testing for me involves the aspect of exploring and playing respectively. There are so many unknown things in software (and much more in life). And my opinion is, that the best way to tease more info out, is to play with it.

Like a child would do - a child plays and asks so unbelievably many questions.

(this picture is by Pamela Adam and is licenced under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 License, source: Flickr)

Testing is really fun - not only my profession.
I hope, you see it the same way (or you will see it like this one day hopefully).

Erkan YILMAZ

I just had this error 500 message:
“In case you have the opinion this is a failure due to the server, contact the webmaster.”

Of course they are right - there can be different reasons for this error, but still: at that moment I just want my task to be done.
If I email the webmaster, this will eventually take even longer. So I retry. And thank God: it works.

But how about, if you place yourself for one moment into your customer ?
E.g. Orkut seems having done this.
When there appears an error, it is told:
Bad, bad server. Today there are no sweets for you.
…
We apologize for the trouble and for the “ruthless” behaviour of our server

I liked this - I even smiled.
But the standard message from my provider is so sh.t.
The request I have to you: make me as customer happy. Even if it is only with an inventive error message. Or better: don’t let even such errors happen.

Erkan YILMAZ

And today I wanted to check for a long domain name, but could not input it, because there is a limit of 75 characters in the input field

Well, I shortened it then to 71 characters: www.thelongestdomainnameintheworldandthensomeandthensomemoreandmore.com
but I got: Can’t start the test. Can’t open URL.

Erkan YILMAZ

First experience: I could not download swift from the swift site:

Ok, the web is big and I found version 0.2 somewhere else.

I installed swift and then wanted to mail developers about the broken download link.
I went in swift to Help > About swift,
then I thought: click on www.getswift.org
and I am forwarded to a site where I am told:
“The domain getswift.com is for sale. To purchase, call…”

Probably I am not the only one, who has such problems with the websites, or?

Well, I closed this tab then and my about-tab is not presented correct:

Nevertheless I will use swift a little more and see what else will happen.
But as you know the first impressions are the important ones.

I will email now the developers and tell them about this (my good deed for today). And if wanted, I can provide then a bug report (this is not the intention of this post)

Erkan YILMAZ

edit:
I emailed developer Chris and wanted to leave also a message on his blog. And found something else: swift does not offer to switch with the tabulator key to the second field. From usability point of view not nice.

I decided to start an experiment: I want to see, which words I use more frequently. And which words cause which reactions in the people. With this I learn something about me and also about others.

But since it is not easy to observe yourself objectively, I will use for this experiment as much help as I can get:
ask my friends and tell them to observe such behaviour more;
I will use tools (e.g. if you have text in written form you can use the freeware program AntConc)

I am curious about, what the experiment will show. Perhaps that I am using in different situations different type of words? Do I use the word xyz while speaking more? (I just analyzed only our chats and I used the word xyz only 34 times over a long period.) Do I use it much more with a certain person ? I can tell you certainly more about that in the future.

So, if you observe that I am repeating something too often, please tell me. Make me happy ! I also will try to make you happy with diversifying my usage of words and telling you what I observe from you.

Erkan YILMAZ

With the benefit of hindsight now – I would associate reading these software testing books with watching a black and white slide show about animals. But now I feel like I am visiting a zoo. I can see the animals now in colour, with their natural sounds, their own special smell, can touch them to get a much better experience.
Well, this is of course only my subjective opinion.

I believe that these “other” books have a much better impact on me than the books which I read before. I will just list a few things and perhaps – from your perspective - not necessarily important ones:
e.g. Bach’s advice: when you need help for a decision: to open any book and ask that page. Feynman and Weinberg show me, how to approach different topics. Heath, McCloud (and Goodman) show interesting aspects on story telling. Von Oech has some interesting ideas (e.g. try to find 5 benefits of sleeping in your clothes) and Barrie helps me in being a kid again.

Erkan YILMAZ

BTW: the picture is blurry isn’t it? I did this on purpose so you must guess some book titles. Who knows perhaps on the search you discover some other interesting books or things?

As I see the problem is: I know what a cat is, but I could not imagine a cat. Could be because normally I do not have contacts to cats.

So, I see two choices now:
- find a cat nearby in real life and get some detailed view on it or (since cats do not want to stand still when I want this)
- perhaps easier: search in Google for some cat pictures and study these and draw after this (but the danger could be that it will be more copying than imagination).

This brings me to the subject, that people have to observe more details from their environment.
In that way that you can imagine objects really when closing the eyes. OK, you could now say: “I do not have the time to have a close look on everything so detailed.” - true. But why not try first with one object?
E.g. while walking stand still and watch your environment. You will see much more, when you hold on for a moment - instead of rushing. Observe your environment ! Then later try to draw what you have selected. And when you have done this, take the picture with you where this object is and compare it.
Did you catch with the picture the object? If not, aren’t you eager to make it better?

Perhaps this will help you to observe much more like a detective or police officer. They can list many details when being asked later for specifics. And if you do not want to be a detective or police officer, be a painter or dreamer or something else what you want to be.
I am sure this will help you in testing.

Erkan YILMAZ

Brazilian Portuguese, Bulgarian, Catalan, Croatian, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Norwegian, Russian, Spanish Chilean, Turkish.

If you would like to help, please drop a message (e.g. with another translation; providing some sound files - you can also give some links to other already existing online files; finding errors; …).

The web is so monotone without sounds, give it some taste with your voice.

Erkan YILMAZ

BTW:
here is a great page for getting much more languages for some greetings.
BBC offers essential holiday phrases - with mp3 sound files.

“Then tell her,” Wendy begged, “to put out her light.”
“She can’t put it out. That is about the only thing fairies
can’t do. It just goes out of itself when she falls asleep, same
as the stars.”
“Then tell her to sleep at once,” John almost ordered.
“She can’t sleep except when she’s sleepy. It is the only
other thing fairies can’t do.”
“Seems to me,” growled John, “these are the only two things
worth doing.” (from Project Gutenberg)

I like this part. Because you see that it is not the only thing fairies can not do, but the info was not given at first by Peter. It is similar to testing: you should not believe only what you get to know at that moment. Explore it more. Then you can put Tinker Bell in the hat or find another solution.

I am wondering what other things Tink and the other fairies are not able to do? For your info: I am reading the book now for the first time, but I watched the movie. I will continue adding at the end of this post, what Tink and/or the other fairies can not do.

The other reason I liked this part was that fairies are limited creatures. If fairies can not do everything, can there be concluded that other creatures can not too?

You can read Peter Pan at Project Gutenberg

Erkan YILMAZ

What fairies are not able to do:
- Tink can not come out from a drawer alone
- Tink can’t go a twentieth part of the way round
- Tink can not fly so slowly (because Wendy, John and Michael can not keep up the speed in flying)
- Tink can only recover from drinking poisoned medicine, when kids believe in fairies.
- When a child says, `I don’t believe in fairies’, one fairy does not survive this and falls down dead.
- Fairies do not live very long (but they are so small, that a short time appears for them very long)
- There is no fairy for every boy and girl.
- There are fairies who have a blue color and they are just little sillies who are not sure what they are.

I am reading at the moment children books, fairy tales and other interesting things. And the more I read, the more I wish I could forget what I have learned so far.

Best would be, if someone would erase my brain so that I can start fresh again. But perhaps this way is even better: now with this attitude perhaps the learning experience can be much better?

Let me find this out.

Erkan YILMAZ

BTW: do not tell right now that I am crazy or dumb or both - wait a few months Perhaps you also would like to be like this then?

And here my live comment.

I immediately informed the person to send me this voice mail. This was a very original comment and I wanted to listen how this sounds. It is interesting what kind of things can make you drift away, laugh or rethink. Of course this is depending on the person; the moment; the things I did just before…
So, you may not find this any interesting at all – right - but think about it: What has recently taken YOUR attention - in this way? Please tell me: there was a moment like this. Also: do you have the possibility to rehear, relive such a moment again?

Let me try to explain why I blog now about this:

- to get to know Erkan better
- one small thing alone can really change something

1.
Getting to know Erkan better:
You remember this article (story telling and pictures) ? I thought that I should add some other elements to make the stories more personal. So, this is the first sound I introduce in my blog. And the first one should be something original - something which shows Erkan live. So this is me. Towards the end of the recording you see how my brain is returning slowly back again - don’t let you irritate by that

2.
One small thing alone can really change something:
Normally I expect - from my experience with other standard answering machine texts - a standard text + standard beep sound (I expected the text “Please leave your message after the beep.” or some other text like: “OK, you now know the routine.”).
So, this was a different way to approach this. How interesting it really is to exchange / implement one small thing and achieve such a reaction by a user (OK, I do not know now the intention of Google of doing it like this - but I liked it).

I am also thinking now of buying me a technical device with which I can record video or take pictures while I am on the road. So I can put these into the future blog articles.

Erkan YILMAZ

BTW: if you know someone implementing a similar style of an answering machine text, please tell me.

As Goodman tells: story telling is powerful, because of:
- the history as a species, that has made us a story telling people since 10000s of years
- our identity, which is comprised of stories – literally who you are is just a group of stories
- there are the cultures that we belong to, which are just stories we all agree are true
- stories help us remember better

So, a good story will catch you or you will not continue reading. So I thought why not include more pictures? This will help you to remember the stories better. I will think of other ideas to tell you even better stories.
I do not (yet) know if I am a good painter or not. But I will try to learn this skill also (have just ordered a book to help me), by adding more pictures to the stories. I am no Picasso, so you will see in the following picture only copy and paste

I think the picture is self explaining, or? You see, what I have done since yesterday evening.

What does the sign ? mean in the picture? Well, I have some plans already for today, but you never know, what will happen next.

See you,
Erkan YILMAZ

I try to give you as reader articles which are as good as possible (of course considering cost and value). Lately I have started to translate my English articles into German (reason here). While doing this, I recognized, that I could have written some articles better.

So, if you think you have nothing to add anymore (well, there is always a better version possible) to an article or you do not want to continue or other reasons, then translate it into another language.

This is my first article which I wrote multilangual on the same day:
1. first in English and
2. then translated into German
3. while doing step 2, I had some new ideas on the result of step 1

I think this will help you to think again more on some words. Because while translating, you are forced to think more on the meaning of one word.
Sometimes I see, that I use English words by instinct – perhaps because I read them a lot and I am used to them (you see the vicious circle?). But when I try to translate them, I sometimes stop, because I do not immediately find the pendant in German. I know what it means, but the German translation hangs on my lips. Somehow it does not find the way out
Then I use a tool – e.g. I use an online translation service (LEO). I am offered several translations. And since German is a language where you can express with different meanings, this gets interesting. With this I get other associations activated in my brain.

You could say, it costs time – this is true. But try it and tell me, if you and your article profit from it or not.

Erkan YILMAZ

While writing this posting, my buddy Chris came along and I told him that I am writing a story about my notepad. He only had a short look at the first sentence and said: “Well, that is a diary – what is so special to write a blog article about it?” He is right: it is nothing special – for him, perhaps also for you too. It is a notepad which costs 70 Euro-Cent and which can be bought at many places. But it is special for me - for what is written in it. I asked him: “Do you have one?” He shook his head and I explained him, what effect it has on me (well, I will not say too much here – not yet - here some preview).
So, if you feel like this posting has no value to you, it may be, because my (or should I say: your ?) context is different.

OK, let’s start with the notepad story:
I am wearing the notepad since this month and write down things that I observe. What kind of things? Well, it always depends: things which I find interesting; for example good or not so good actions of myself; … I hope you can guess what I mean.
At the beginning when others saw the notepad they asked: “What is this for?” - they were curious (this is a good attitude). Now they got used to it.
Perhaps I needed this booklet to help me reflect upon things. Before, I also tried to write, when I came home. But this did not work out that good. Now the notepad is always with me, I do not feel it anymore – it has become a part of me. I just grab it and can reflect on the content, when I want to. I only take it off, when I go to sleep or when I take a shower.
As I told Chris, the content of the notepad and what this lets me do counts. The notepad helps me in changing. Changing to what? Well, let’s see that.

You probably think now: “Erkan did not detail enough.” Well, from time to time I will tell some stories. My intention for now is to tell only this and that these 70 Cent were a very good investment. Please also try it out yourself. Let the others joke about it. Unfortunately they miss something, since they do not try. Would these 70 Cent really be such a high loss?

Now only four pages are left - so I will need a new one pretty soon.

edit on 2007 April 2:
I bought today not only one notepad. Reason: I got a discount after asking This will probably last for about 1 year.

Erkan YILMAZ

I am asking myself, why e.g. some places for testers to meet have limited access and also require a fee? So far I did not see any other German blogging place for testers like
TestingReflections or the Indian software testing bloggers community.
This is my personal view - who knows, perhaps I did not search enough. If so, please drop me a message.

All we need, we get for free (blogs with web space, ideas to write about, …).
I must say, that I have gained already a lot because of interacting online with people and blogging. So, why don’t you want to get rich in experience?

Everybody can participate - testing means asking questions. So everybody could test and learn to test respectively, let’s join multiple fields together: could be anyone from … to … (with purpose I do not write more, because anything is possible).

If you are someone who questions and you have a blog or website, contact me.
Let’s unite and share ideas.
I have already some ideas and platform features I can provide. But I am also eager to hear your opinion.

Erkan YILMAZ

So, I decided to show this also in the name of my blog:
Iaskquestions.com

So, we agreed, that I do some further testing on this.

How did I proceed?

1. Search some background info on Google translator (e.g. it was fed with 200 billion words).

2. But well, I did not want to read at that time too much and also maintain my curiosity, so I continued like this:
get me some random sentences.

I went to yahoo and searched for “english site” and took this website for getting me some random English text. Reason: this is a site especially for learning and teaching English – as it tells: “A web-site for teachers and learners of English as a secondary language from a German point of view”.
So, my intention here was: to get something for the benefit for Google, as I assume this kind of text would be better translated (do not get me wrong: for testing I would take later some text which is e.g. more technical, nested, … to challenge the application more )

3. Then I decided to take about every 5th sentence from there (why every 5th? well, which would you have used?) - here are the 16 sentences.

4. So, I started to translate these sentences with Google translator to German (since I have no version info on Google Translator for rechecking later: at 20.3.2007, 21:38 German time (GMT+1)). The sentences which (from my point of view) were translated perfect, I marked with OK - see here the results.
So this makes until now a ratio of about 48% (2 out of the 5 sentences from the conversation and 8 from the above 16 sentences).

Then I translated the remaining 8 not-OK sentences how I would like them myself (using one time LEO) - see here.

Actually the tests are not yet finished, I just gave some random input (16 sentences only - from my point of view easy sentences) to get me an impression on the quality. So, we have now a number - 48% - whatever this might tell. I wonder how much other online translators (Babelfish uses Systran, PROMT, … ) would achieve? But does this prove anything so far? It just tells: for these sentences it had this result - how good this works for each one of us is another case.

But well, it is late and perhaps you can help me testing? Otherwise I will continue soon.

I searched (of course in Google ) for other old bugs from Google translator. Found e.g. these: hit, hit, hit

Erkan YILMAZ

BTW:
Michael has listed here web services for English/German + vice versa translations. My all time favorite is LEO.
Michael plans to write a series on translation tools - so drop by his blog.

Please read it and then come back (if not, no problem, testingreflections has lots of good blogs).

I implemented this technique also and I see some positive effect.
I have a blackboard in the company where I paint my share price for different aspects (won’t tell you now what
aspects exactly - this is my secret for now. But if it helps you: also nobody else knows it, it is in coded form ).
On the X-axis I have my aspects and the Y-axis has 3 values: good, middle, bad

The great thing with this is:
Every time I see it, I think of how to improve my share value, so that at the end of the day I am a top seller
As it was told in the posting above, sometimes it is hard to maintain your value on top. But no worries, there is always a next day at the stock exchange.

I can recommend this - get yourself a blackboard or alike immediately.

Erkan YILMAZ

I do not want to belch like people perhaps would do when they eat a lot. Let’s see if there will come more than just this kind of air through my mouth. After I have fully digested, you will see some more activity in this blog.

Erkan YILMAZ

If I am sitting somewhere and have some time (because in 5 minutes you can not talk that deep), I start a talk with strangers around me and get to know details on their profession. Of course some people are not willing to talk to strangers, but some are
Reason is: I want to know what I can use for my profession from their profession/experience. Won`t tell you now, what the result is - must still do some more research.

So far I had following professions (sorted alphabetically):
financial auditor
innkeeper
metalworker
office management assistant
varnisher

Erkan YILMAZ

sometimes also one left click makes 2 left clicks at once - let’s see what other failures I will encounter.

At first this was very unpleasant, because it costs more time: now I am forced to do the same actions with other methods: e.g. copy+paste by cursor.
These things interrupt me in my normal behaviour. They pull me out of my thoughts and I must think how to solve this to complete my goal.

It is interesting how much the mouse as input device influences our life.
Didn’t think much about it - but now I am also eager not to buy that fast a mouse (of course I will buy a new mouse eventually, if all begging to my mouse won’t help), so I can learn more from this.
Imagine: if during testing your mouse gets disabled somehow, would you still be able to continue testing (when seeing testing now in the context of executing tests on the test object) as effective or efficient as you want? See it as a test for you, when something interrupts you a lot during testing, are you able to master this?
I also want to learn how I can use other input devices even more (e.g. keyboard with the appropriate short cuts; observing, if a program offers me other possibilities to do what I want to do,…)

Also: I want to try to heal my mouse by mental thoughts
(I also had a look inside it and cleaned my mouse, but this did not help) - I am not giving up hope now, my mouse served me well in the past, so why not wait a little longer, before I put it in the trash can? Wonders may happen. Imagine which other objects/persons in your life are touched so often as your mouse by your hand, would you also treat them like this, when they do not “serve” you no more?

Erkan YILMAZ

I wanted to show and prove me that I am able of doing this and that in software testing.
But so less I knew - these are just exterior things, tools.

So, I decided to decrease my online activities to a few, so I can concentrate on my personal skills more.
And this needs reflection and time.

I hope you are not disappointed about this - be happy for me, that I made such a decision.
Like always in life, there are many ways to look on something: without these activities, I probably would not have realized, what is really important. And I am thankful for this.
I am sure, you will see, that version 2.0 of Erkan will be much better than version 1.0

Erkan Yilmaz

Since my profession is that of a tester (yes, you read correct, I truly identify myself as tester), I will let others speak for their profession. Reason is: they know probably better which skills are the important ones. I will try later also to assess from my opinion, but why not let someone involved in the material speak first? My task is to find the best sources and list them here.
I am sure there are other views than what I got in my fingers - if you find a better one (there is always a better version) tell me please.

Dr. Ulrike Hennemann tells in her article “Is my doctor a good doctor?” how patients can check themselves for the quality of their medical care, because:
many people would - so she tells - ask themselves if the doctor they confide in matters of precaution or in case of illness masters really the craft. From the following, people can not read the knowledge and skills: that the doctor is friendly, wears always a fresh ironed white coat or offers a comfortable waiting room.

She then lists the following points of a good doctor:
- being up to date in the area of expertise
- take care for the patients
- make correct diagnoses
- select the correct therapy according to the circumstances
- transfer early enough to a specialist

-being up to date in the area of expertise
she tells that patients can ask their doctor, if s(he) regularly takes part in further education. She tells that the doctor might look first piqued, but should understand this and see it as positive.

What would you answer as tester, if you are asked, if you regularly do something for your education (in testing)? Thanks to the internet there is many good material available. You just have to reserve the time. It really is so simple. So, now there is no excuse anymore for you.
Testing may seem as a simple task for outsiders, but we testers know it is much more. We have so much to learn and so many ways to evolve. Start this by educating yourself as soon as possible. You are the one who is responsible for your education - no one else will take care for it.

-take care for the patients
Does the doctor listen carefully? address the issue appropriate on questions? explains the examination and therapy recommendations? Do you leave the doctor with the good feeling that your issue was taken seriously and the doctor did the best possible for you?
Dr. Hennemann tells, when she has to go to a doctor it is for her important, that she does not have to wait too long. She tells that has not directly something to do with the quality of the doctor, but indirect: if a doctor values on behalf of the patients and his/her team on time scheduling, probably (s)he also is good in the above 5 points.

So, let’s find out, who would be actually our patients? In the patient doctor scenario, the patient comes to the doctor to get help. Who do we help as testers? There are different groups whom we help: our stakeholders and/or our colleagues, our friends + family (I mean testing does not stop, when we leave office), ourselves - pretty much anybody
I also would go so far, that we help our test object. It comes to us and asks for help, but then somehow is ashamed - after we find so many problems - to tell all its flaws. Sometimes it is also just to make our time worth while, it brings us to different problems, so that our life even gets more interesting and challenging. So, why not help in return the test object by making it even better for these favors?

Do you always take appropriate care for the people/test objects coming to you? Do they come back again to search for your advise? Think about it, do they thank you, appreciate you?

-make correct diagnoses
if a therapy was successful, most of the time the diagnosis also was correct. But also experienced, good educated doctors do not get the assessment about the causes of the symptoms correct always right at first. There are ways to prevent unneeded expensive examinations. For smaller pains, doctors can use your telling and simple examination methods (e.g. listen with the stethoscope, scanning with their hand the part of the body) to pose first a suspected diagnosis, which is most likely and start after this the first treatment try.

Imagine 2000 years ago as doctor the technical possibilities were limited. Therefore medical thinking and acting was based on correct interpretation of signs of the body. Do you have all the technical equipment you need/wish?
As testers we always have less time than we want. In such a case wasting the time with unneeded tests can be painful (also for your stakeholders). Take advantage of all your information sources you have. Observe everything and infer from these. When you collect and analyze, you get closer to the solution of the problem. You should always seek for a logical/qualitative reason for your assumptions.
Start to question yourself always, is this really correct what I do? Is there not a better way to find the most critical problems? Trust your instinct, but also take advise. If possible start a journal - so you are forced to reflect on your decisions. What went wrong or was good? And why? Also: the better diagnoses you pose, the more credibility you will have.

-select the correct therapy according to circumstances
if for a certain time the first treatment try was not successful, more detailed and expensive technical methods are used (e.g. ultrasound) to find the cause for the symptoms.
But doctors should be allowed also to make mistakes. It is not uncommon that even skilled doctors do not see the cause immediately and therefore not start the correct therapy. In such a case visit again your doctor, so (s)he can analyze this more.

The first diagnose is important, but how to proceed then? Each patient is different and needs different approaches/methods. So, how can we treat/cure/minimize our patients problems? The more experience you have, the more ways you know to have a direct or indirect influence on others/other things. You can help then depending on the context.
Also by giving them good bug reports, we give them help to identify the main problems. I mean, finding bugs is essential, but what, if the bugs aren’t communicated good enough? So the bugs would then be not known or fixed fast enough? As testers we give as much info as possible as soon as possible to identify the critical bugs. So, let’s do this in the best way possible.
Here are links, how to write good bug reports and to convince the reader of the bug report to fix them:
Cem Kaner, Effective bug reporting (slides, video)

What always helps is to understand, that quality is everybody’s matter - only together as team a good product will be released.

-transfer early enough to a specialist
as a patient you can hardly assess when the time has come that you are transferred to a specialist. But you can set the impulse yourself, when your pain does not go away, ask your doctor to be transferred. If your doctor does not agree, (s)he surely will tell the reasons.

So, you are like the rest of us: you make errors or you do not know everything?
If you have made an error, admit this and try to do the best to rescue the situation, otherwise you will lose credibility. Also: we are just humans, we can not see/catch every Darwin bug.
[So, what is a Darwin bug?
Some bugs (I call them Darwin bugs ) are difficult to find by us and other bugs are easily found. The bugs compete with each other to come to life. So what makes the Darwin-bugs better than the others? What do they have? How does it happen that they pass all the barriers? What are their characteristics?]

Humans are not God, so show your lack of knowledge instead of showing false mastery, which will lead to unhappiness on both sides. Actually don’t the Alcoholics Anonymous also tell: “My name is … and I am an alcoholic.” So, if you do not know something, tell this also frankly: “I am tester … and I do not know this, please go to …”. You could add: “I will use my free time and improve my skill in that area, so I can help you better next time.”

Remember, in “The Hippocratic Oath” (from 400 B.C.) it is written:
“… I will not cut for stone, even for patients in whom the disease is manifest; I will leave this operation to be performed by practitioners, specialists in this art. …”
This was a way of risk minimizing for the doctor.
In the old times besides ethical reasons also monetary reasons played a role for this. It would have been bad for the reputation of the doctor to worsen the illness with a wrong treatment.

In her article Dr. Hennemann also lists a checklist for “How to recognize a good doctor’s practice?”.

Dr. Ulrike Hennemann
is a doctor and editor-in-chief for Medical Tribune
printed in:
Medical Tribune, Gesundheit & Medizin
title: “Ist mein Arzt ein guter Arzt?” (engl. “Is my doctor a good doctor?“)
page 41-43
December 2006, Medical Tribune Verlagsgesellschaft mbH
Wiesbaden, Germany

Cem Kaner, “Effective bug reporting” (Tutorial session) 15th International Software Quality Conference (Quality Week), San Francisco, CA, September, 2002.

Wikipedia about The Hippocratic Oath

1st question: With which shoe lace do you begin?
2nd question: Do you start most of the time with the right or the left one?
3rd question: Did you ever think of starting with the other shoe lace?
4th question: If not, why?

Question 3 I had, when binding my shoe laces. So, I select always another shoe lace than the day before.
I think when you start with small things like this, this can help to not take the usual paths and also take other ones, which you do not take anymore.

Imagine since how long you always have this habbit with the shoe laces.
What would be different when starting with the other one first? Would this cost a little more time? Could your brain get activated a little more? What do you think?

How about, if you extend this to other things like:
Writing with the other hand. Well, this would be difficult at beginning. But it will let you think of situations which you normally not think of: e.g. people who are disabled.
Wouldn’t this change perspective for you? When was the last time you thought of disabled people?

How about entering the car from the co-driver side?
This takes probably more time. Probably others could think: “This (wo)man is crazy.” or “When does (s)he repair the other door?”
But don’t you think you would see your car from another perspective? When did you sit the last time on the co-driver side of your own car?

I guess you get the idea…
You always have the choice which way to take - would it be that bad to take also other ways?

Erkan Yilmaz

Happened just to me: I have produced big work - well this one I did at the toilet. First, I felt eased.
But I did not look before, if there was enough paper left. Perhaps I was still sleeping, because I woke up recently.
When I grabbed the paper, I thought: “Will this be sufficient?”

You could now say: “Man, don’t you buy/store enough paper in the toilet?” Well, I did not buy any before, because I thought it would suffice until today.

So, in that situation I hoped: “This must suffice.” And used then the paper wisely.
I was alone for the time being in the appartment. So, I could have also gotten a substitute from the kitchen. But you could imagine, how I would look like: pants down walking through the appartment. Since nobody was there at that time, also no problem
Well, I could also use water to clean my a..

This incident let me rethink my visits in the toilet lately. I do not always use the paper wisely - I take too much often. If I think about it now: I can save even money with this (well, it may be not much money, but still…) and also help the environment.

So, the toilet paper awakes an analogy for me to the ressources in testing. We plan wisely our ressources for testing, but there are situations, where you have no toilet paper anymore.
So, either accept this fact always and hope that the ressources will suffice - but well this can have shitty outcome (I do not want to get in a situation where I have to use water).
If you are in such a situation, try then to find substitutes. There are always substitutes - you just have to imagine, how you can use xyz to fulfill your needs.
Or do not wait until it gets to that: start using the toilet paper wisely and plan in advance by observing.

Erkan Yilmaz

edit on 2007-03-31:
“One of life’s most overvalued pleasures is sexual intercourse; and, one of life`s least appreciated pleasures is defecation.” (Mark Twain)

If I leave my appartment, I am always sure, that I can go back inside again.
I learned as child: always check - before closing the door - if you have your keys with you.

And with time, I do this now intuitively - just a short check in my pocket, until I hear sound or feel there is a bow (not what you think now ).
The result is, that I always can go inside the appartment again (well, I could also by kicking in the door - but this would cause other problems).
Also other things come to mind, e.g.:
When I am with someone else and I hear key sound or we are standing at the door - I watch them and ask: “Do you have your keys?” So, this can help others too. But it could also be seen as redundant, because the other person already checked - this also has to be observed.
Or it could be said: “You are insecure/not self confident. You must do mechanical repetition.” Just a question: Do you know me well enough, to say so? How would you approach it? Don’t you condition/train yourself like this?

What does this mean?
If you want to learn something, start it by training yourself. Take really the time to do it. If you invest now, you will profit in the future from this. It all begins with the first step and repetition to stay on track.

In this case I want to learn to use heuristics more efficient.
So, reading about it is fine, but writing about it will help me more. Probably this will cost me more time. But I think I will profit from this a lot (when seeing it under cost and value).
So, as Confucius said 450 BC: “Tell Me and I Will Forget; Show Me and I May Remember; Involve Me and I Will Understand.”
Now I try to involve myself more with heuristics and blog about it.

Erkan Yilmaz

Now I would like to add heuristics of my own (though we did not cover the topic itself yet - but I have seen some heuristics/mnemonics recently by others and now I am eager to also approach this topic).
Reading about heuristics is fine, but you better make your own ones, so you can take them in.
So, if you see, that my heuristics can be improved, please tell me, so I can improve them (and me).

Forgive me, if I select sometimes topics which are not polite. But I think with these I can better remember. And also: this is my way of doing it

So, what is a heuristic ? (see James’ slides v 2.1.1 page 49)
a heuristic is “a fallible method for solving a problem or making a decision.”
Heuristics bring useful structure to problem-solving skill.

“Heuristic reasoning is not regarded as final and strict but as provisional and plausible only, whose purpose is to discover the solution to the present problem.” - George Polya, How to Solve It

Or as David Gilbert tells:
“Fallible?”, you may ask, “Why would I want to use something that’s fallible?” Well, lets look at a slightly different wording of that same idea…a heuristic is a general rule of thumb that works most of the time. Now we can begin to see the value. It is general, and works most of the time, so it can provide a solution quickly, without thinking very hard or very long about it.

Where can I see some example heuristics? You can start here.

Erkan YILMAZ