Nishant Verma

Install Flipboard on your Android Device

2012-05-09T22:06:00.001+05:30

Navigate to this website: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1644212
You will find an attachment Flipboard.apk
Download that on your android device
Install it , thats all.
You should be able to surf Flipboard.

I got it working on my Kindle Fire tablet. This is how it looks.

Review of KoolKart

2012-05-08T11:14:00.001+05:30

This post is basically the review of a new website - KoolKart.

KoolKart will sound interesting to folks who make online purchases. There are couple of sites which do the same, so the idea is not unique. Uniqueness should be in the implementation. When you visit the Koolkart website:

The first impression you get is- it’s just another online retail site, which it is not. Koolkart is not a online retailer, so you don’t need a big panel on your left which shows you to “Log in”. Why would I want to log in just to see which retailer is giving me the cheapest rate. Also from a user point of view, he/she need not make 3-4 clicks to reach that page.

Basically I am coming from – whether you want to make Google like stuff where you don’t stay on home page for more than 3 seconds or you want to make Yahoo like stuff which wants you to stay on it’s website.

The first half of the page is almost of no-use to me. Being a first time user, I don’t know if i will be coming back. So I don’t think I will create a user id for myself. Also I felt there is too much of emphasis on Sign Up (or use Facebook). To me that’s a little No-No.

Generally people visiting this website would have made some online purchases in past. I am discounting the first time visitor as they would hear Flipkart/Junglee/Myntra/Jabong first. So you actually don’t need to show them how it works. It should be quite intuitive. Those videos make sense for demonstration of software tools and not how to use a website.

Let’s get into the next page.

As a typical User I would click on “view more” on what’s in frame. This piss me off big time. I don’t want to log in. I will hit back button and try to find if there is any textbox for me to enter what i am looking for. I didn’t find any.

Hold on there is something for my help. Scroll the page down, in the right most bottom corner you will see Categories. God I am lucky, these are not just texts but hyper links which I was actually looking for. I am clicking Book there.

Ahhh, this page is making me feel a little happy. Since I come from using at least Flipkart/Junglee/Myntra/Jabong, I feel this is more of a known UX. But again the same “Log in “ stuff.

I guess they need to remove it and re-order the sections, View by Friends first, then Filter By and then Login (if they can’t remove it).

I entered some characters of the book (I am looking for Fooled by Randomness)and saw a list coming up. This is good, I need not type the whole stuff. The auto-complete starts showing up after 3 characters itself. Also if the auto-complete highlight the characters entered, it would be great.

Sort by doesn’t work. It shows values Popularity, Price and Recently Karted. But changing to any of them doesn’t work. May be it requires login, but doesn’t show me anywhere.

On the Search Result page, when I scroll to see the results at bottom, whole page moves down. I think they should introduce frames and keep the top portion and left portion fixed, so that when I scroll only the results sections scroll.

Instead of “About us”, “Tutorial”, “button” on top , there could be a bottom bar which hosts these things.

I think this has grown a little long. Will continue this in another blog post. My interest in this website is because I had the same idea an year before, so I took some time out to go through their website and give them some feedback.

Knowing what you don't Know

2012-05-05T18:18:00.000+05:30

How do we claim "What we know" ? Knowing - Is it something that we have heard of ? Or Is it something which we have read about and almost forgotten it so I have just a little (almost no idea) idea about that? Or is it something which we know almost everything about?

Most of the time what we actually know is a fraction of our perceived notion of "knowing". This is described as illusion of explanatory depth.

So what happens is we generally form a circle around things and claim that we "know" it. This prevents us from actually knowing it and let us remain in that "complacency" that we know it. So what I have learnt over a period of time is "admit frankly what you don't know", it will help you extend your knowledge.

Next time when someone brings up some topic which you claim to know but actually don't know then make a entry in your learning diary about that word. When you reach home/office, search it on web or talk to people and try to gain knowledge about it. Engaging in social learning also helps expand our knowledge. It requires more knowledge to explain someone something and instruct them. So when you think you have understood something well then try to explain that to someone. Also when someone asks you counter question that is when your real "knowing" gets evaluated. Explaining something to someone is such a satisfactory feeling.

Installing Apps on Kindle Fire Tablet

2012-03-25T11:06:00.000+05:30

I bought Kindle Fire Tablet almost 3 months back and still there is no support from Amazon to install apps on the tablet if you are outside US. I figured out a way to get apps installed on Kindle Fire. Neither you need to point to any parallel app store nor you need to root your kindle fire. Let me give you some simple steps in which you can install apps:

Turn ON "Allow Installation of applications"
Open Web and navigate to http://www.4shared.com
Search for 4shared.apk file (.apk file are installers for Android based devices)
Download the file and install it
Once 4shared is installed, search for anything like "Facebook for Android" and look for .apk file
Once found download the file and install it.

There would be some .apk file which might not run properly, you may want to look for some other file and install it. I tried for apps like 4Shared, Nimbuzz, Facebook, Twitter, Skype, VLC, File Explorer and it worked perfectly fine. You can definitely look for some more apps and install it from there.

Why not to hurry with your action plan !

2012-03-02T22:01:00.002+05:30

There are different kinds of person and obviously different kinds of problem solving strategy. So where is this blog coming from? This is based on my latest project assignment. A team which has some process in place (not the best though, but people admit it and want to move to next level), some problems as perceived by me because of me being new to the team and not yet saturated with things around. So how do you go about tackling it?

Take some time in understanding why there are certain things dealt in a certain way, understand what people values and what not, what is important to them, why they do certain things in a certain way? Based on your previous experience or theoretical team (which you would have read in blogs or some books) chart out what things are already in and what else you want to get in. Discuss with your team members and get their feel on that stuff. Chart out a plan with time line attached to it and go for it. Analyzing this way and having spend some time you would know where the obstructions will come from and who will come to your rescue when you hit a dead-end.

You might need to involve other stake holder as well and take ownership yourself for few items to drive and prove that it works. If it doesn't work input the feedback/learning back into the system and re-work. Simple :)

10 days in UK (Ipswich)

2012-02-27T00:10:00.001+05:30

UK was always on my travel list. I am in Ipswich for some project work for some time. It’s a good place. I am staying in a hotel near to harbour so I get a very good view from my window. Almost all the pics are shot from my window :)

Some more pics on the way…

We call it “vodQA” and it’s free to attend!

2012-01-31T12:04:00.000+05:30

What is it? vodQA is a platform for members of the software testing industry to strengthen the QA community by sharing and learning new practices and ideas. vodQA is a series of testing events hosted by ThoughtWorks across our India offices. This is the first time it will take place in Bangalore. The series is open to all testing professionals from the IT industry.

“When” and “Why” about Locators

2012-01-25T15:04:00.000+05:30

Generally when we are writing our automation test in Selenium or any other driver , the first thing we tend to do is start looking for object Id. Thought we have multiple ways of getting the hold of the object on a webpage like:

Id
name
Link text
XPath
DOM

Id or name is the most simplest and easy to use locators. Advantages with them is it increases the readability of your test code. It’s also better than other locators in terms of test performance. If you are using lot of Id’s and your test code is becoming too clumsy then one suggested way of using Id’s would be to have a separate file and then probably you can rename them if they are not properly named in the page source (Google page “q” as their search box Id).

Link Text is mostly used with links and limited to that. They are easy to use. However they are a little problematic to maintain because of often changing link texts.

Next is the famous XPath, simple to use (if you are using Firebug or any other add-in to get it) but makes your test code look ugly. XPath should generally be used when the object is having neither Id nor name. Problem with XPath is when we run the test, browser runs it XPath processor to check if it can find any object, which actually impacts the performance. One important thing which we tend to forget while using XPath is, it ensures the order of elements. So it should be used to verify some object with respect to certain other object. One example could be to verify if “Today’s Deal” appears with in the header section of the Amazon home page.

DOM I haven’t used much so can’t comment on that.

Testing Web application using AndroidDriver

2012-01-12T15:50:00.000+05:30

This blog is mostly like a “How to” post on testing web application using Eclipse IDE, JUnit and AndroidDriver. What all you need ? Eclipse (version 3.7), JUnit, selenium-server-standalone-2.15.0.jar and of course Android SDK.

Before you do anything, you need to install Android Emulator on Windows, and then install WebDriver on that emulator:

Post the set up, you can refer below to download the sample test framework from Github to get started

https://github.com/nishantverma/Android

This is a test framework skeleton and can be leveraged for specific testing requirements.

Feedback

2012-01-01T23:52:00.000+05:30

On Friday, I just finished "Group Feedback" session. Well I don't want to blog about what happened in that feedback. This post is more from the point of view of "Why we need feedback?".

What is "feedback"? Wikipedia defines feedback as

Feedback describes the situation when output from (or information about the result of) an event or phenomenon in the past will influence an occurrence or occurrences of the same (i.e. same defined) event / phenomenon (or the continuation / development of the original phenomenon) in the present or future. When an event is part of a chain of cause-and-effect that forms a circuit or loop, then the event is said to "feed back" into itself.

We work in team and the team is made up of "Individuals". The behavior of individuals influence the outcome of team , may be in a positive manner or negative! A team is constituted to achieve a certain goal and so the team members behavior is very crucial for team success. Over a period of time when you work together, you learn about positives and negatives of a person. This helps you in understanding the person a little more and gel with them in a better manner. Somewhere I feel, this adds to the productivity of the team.

In a group feedback session, when you listen to people who are giving feedback to others, you actually get to know what they expect in their team members. This helps understanding the team better. One way to improve ourselves at what we do is to seek periodical feedback and sincerely work on the improvement items. So this feedback shouldn't be one time activity like once in a year kind and could be scheduled every 3 months or 6 months so that team is better equipped in attaining the designated goals. During my 6+ years of experience, I have never seen this as a team driven activity. I have always seen this task coming up when we near the financial review period. In some organizations I have seen that people will actually wait till the end of the year to give you feedback that you were wrong (with respect to certain tasks). I really pity those people as they think feedback is to point out someone's mistake rather than a chance to help someone improve themselves and collaborate better. So it becomes more of a formality rather than a necessity.

Most of the time onus lies on individuals; I have seen people willing to learn and improve and also few people who doesn't believe in these things. Well this post will not change any perception about "feedback" for people who doesn't believe in that. But my suggestion to them is "Feedback matters"!

IE shares falling down, Chrome is coming up !

2011-11-03T20:00:00.000+05:30

Internet Explorer does less than 50 percent of world's web surfing, Chrome on the come-up -- Engadget: "Microsoft's finest still has a healthy 52.63 percent desktop market share, which gives it a sizable lead over the competition from Firefox (23 percent), Chrome (18 percent), and Safari (five percent)"

'via Blog this'

Learning from Twist Workshop Session

2011-10-03T16:19:00.001+05:30

Conducting a workshop on Testing tool is not new for me. In past I have given the same for QTP and other tools in my previous organization. How was this different ? What’s new for me ?

I noticed that these kind of sessions mostly revolves around tool. Those sessions were mostly like Feature drill down from Day-1 to last day nothing but just features. During my QTP days, I used to prepare a Power point presentation of features and snapshot of screen flows to illustrate it. What’s different in conducting Twist session. I actually thought of experimenting. I listed down all the critical features which I thought of discussing and then finalized on the application (which was Mingle , a Project Management Tool from ThoughtWorks Studios).

I started session with a persona of a QA on a testing team of Mingle (AUT) who will be involved in writing test cases, testing Story acceptance criteria and finally automating it. So it was easy for me to map the requirements of a Tester with the features of the Tool. If a tool is unaware of my day to day activity then it’s not the right fit. I believe that Test Automation tool should not be in isolation. So it was easy for me to demonstrate them how easy it is to write your test cases in Twist.

We started with identifying scenarios in the AUT, we then wrote couple of test scenarios and the relevant test cases. Once we were done with writing test cases, next comes the automation. So people just started automating the tests and again it was easy for them. When they started playing it back, they realized the data dependency and they themselves felt the need for Context (Setup and Teardown).

Apart from the basic features, I also felt that audience keeps comparing the tool under demo with the past tool they have used for almost all the features. They also give some feedback based on their experience of past tools. Some features I felt is always meant for advanced user or at least some one needs to use this tool for quite sometime to understand it. But with proper example you can always overcome that or otherwise a Sample Tutorial always helps.

Over all I liked the Workshop session and demonstrating Twist.

QTP (Keyword Driven) Vs. Twist (Page object pattern)

2011-09-16T18:35:00.003+05:30

Previous two posts Web Application Testing (QTP Vs. Twist) and Test Creation (QTP Vs. Twist) talks more about the features in the tool and ease of use. Following my two blog posts where I have compared QTP with Twist, this blog post is next in the series which will talk about Test framework and maintenance in both the tools.

When you launch QTP, you will notice that the Process Guidance pane shows you a path to achieve what QTP has popularized in the Testing community as “Keyword-Driven Testing”.

[Keyword Driven Testing is a technique that separates much of the programming work from the actual test steps so that the test steps can be developed earlier and can often be maintained with only minor updates, even when the application or testing needs change significantly]

-QTP Help File on “Keyword Driven Testing”

This technique relies on 3 pillars:

Test Steps
Keywords
Object Repository

So a tester generally writes Test steps using the keywords, tester with technical knowledge creates function library using built-in keywords or their own user-defined keywords and maintain Object Repository. So a slight change in application would require changes in Object Repository and then the functions.

[The keyword-driven methodology is especially useful for organizations that have both technical and less technical users because it offers a clear division of automation tasks. This enables a few experts to maintain the resource framework while less technical users design and maintain automated test steps. Additionally, after the basic infrastructure is in place, both types of users can often do their jobs simultaneously. ]

-QTP Help File on “Keyword Driven Testing”

So QTP Keyword Driven Testing approach actually requires a significant manpower to create a Test Suite and maintain it. Also if you are following this testing technique (Keyword Driven), you need to put a significant effort in creating the infrastructure and then start writing the test cases. So it takes up considerable amount of time before you see the benefit out of QTP.

On the other hand if you are using Twist, it’s like you download it, install it and start automating your tests right from the day-1. You see an immediate benefit from the tool unlike QTP (Where in you will have to wait for quite some time may be a month, 2 months or 15 days till the basic infrastructure is built). Twist do provide a user some guide line to use the tool but you don’t need such heavy infrastructure to write test. All you need is the domain knowledge or the application under test.

[Writing your scenarios at the right level of abstraction is critical to building an effective test suite. Here are a few guidelines that can help you get there.

Tests should be independent of the user interface of the application.
Tests should strive to be at the highest level of abstraction possible, without sacrificing readability.
Don't repeat yourself: Repeating a series of steps at any level -- at a scenario, or in the implementation can increase the maintenance overhead.
Use Extract Concept and Push to Implementation to achieve granularity that reflects your domain and also promotes reuse
Your test should ideally be an illustration of the functionality as opposed to some UI mechanics. For instance, if a test reads:
shopping cart
- enter "5" in units and "10.0" in price and select "air shipping" in shipping dropdown
Description of the UI clutters the intent here. Instead the test:
shopping cart
- create order for "5" units at price "10.0" for "air shipping"

helps clarify the intent.]

-Twist Help File on “Guidelines for your Test Suite”

Following a Page Object pattern is a nice way to group all the actions that are possible on a given screen.

Again Twist provides you more benefits than QTP when it comes to Test Suite Creation and maintaining them.

Test Creation (QTP Vs. Twist)

2011-09-14T14:30:00.000+05:30

After downloading QTP (Version 11), I started using it to test my sample application which is a project management tool. I must say that the “Process Guidance” stuff is really good for first time users. It tells them how to create and organize your test in a step by step manner (One thing which is not present in Twist).

So I started with creating a lay out of the project by creating Actions which are logical name for Test scenarios like “Login”, “Create Project”, “Create Card” in QTP.

Left side of the below image shows how the test looks in QTP and right side shows how it looks in the tool I am using Twist.

So once the project lay out was created in QTP I started recording the test. This is how it looks in QTP. QTP shows me the recorded script and I can add comments to that script to tell the intention of recording. However Recorded Script doesn’t help anyone apart from me to understand what this test does.

Let’s go to the tool I am using Twist. Once the project lay out is created, I can write what my test will do. Then I can further break down my test scenario into different test steps and record each of them one by one. Also all this is in plain English and any one can understand it.

So when I record the test for each step, it generates an underlying Java method which looks as shown below. I have highlighted the method name.

So my test can be easily read by any one on the team irrespective of their knowledge about the code. So I don’t need two Testing Tool/Software to write my manual test cases and then automate.

This is another reason why I would use Twist for test automation and not QTP.

Web application Testing (QTP Vs. Twist)

2011-09-14T12:31:00.000+05:30

I downloaded QTP (Trial Version 11) few days back and I thought of seeing what’s new in the tool.I have a Dell Machine with Windows 7 installed on it. Browsers installed on my machine are:

Firefox (Version 6.0.2)
IE (Version 9.0.2)
Chrome (Version 13.0.782.220)

QTP allows me to setup the environment before recording test. So I can navigate to

Automation –> Record and Run Settings. The pop below shows up. I can set the application URL there and when I pull the browser drop down, it just shows up Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Though I have Firefox, Chrome installed on my box, they do not shows up in the list. So when I opened the “HP QuickTest Professional Product Availability Matrix” pdf I was shocked to see the below matrix. Are you serious ?

If I am testing a web application I would want to test it on various browsers available at least Firefox (Version 4, 5, 6), Chrome (Version 12, 13) and IE 9 (on Windows 7).

I looked back at my tool which I am using right now (Twist) and I saw the list which appears below. Read more here about the supported web browsers.

Link:http://www.thoughtworks-studios.com/twist-agile-test-automation/2.3/help/system_req.html

One reason why I would use Twist for web application Testing and not QTP.

Testing Web Application on Android Emulator using Twist 2.3

2011-08-17T12:37:00.001+05:30

Twist 2.3 supports Selenium 2. So let’s take a sample mobile web application to Test.

Application under Test: Wikipedia Mobile
URL: http://mobile.wikipedia.org/

Let’s say the basic test scenarios we want to automate is

Navigate to the URL
Search for "Thoughtworks Studios"
Open the link "Twist for Agile testing"
Verify the link "ThoughtWorks"

Let’s run through few steps which will enable us to do that.

Step 1: Create a new Twist project with Selenium 2.0 as underlying driver and Firefox as the browser and Click on Finish.

Step 2: On the New Scenario Page in Scenario Editor, create a new Business Workflow

Step 3: Start recording the steps. (This will help you record the test in Firefox.)

Step 4: Open the Project properties and Select the Twist Properties and click on the Selenium2 tab. Select Android Browser for the browser.

Step 5: Make sure the android emulator is running (Webdriver Installed) and pointing to the android server at “http://localhost:8080/wd/hub”. To install Android Emulator use the following help.

Step 6: Execute the scenario.

Refer the attached video which records the test on a browser and plays it back on Android Emulator.

Twist 2.3 is out and allows Emulator Testing

You can download Twist 2.3 here

Twist 2.3 is out !

2011-08-11T16:36:00.000+05:30

ThoughtWorks Studios just released Twist 2.3. Read more about it here.

Just a quick look into the new features and improvements.

Selenium2: Allows Recording & Playback of web application with Selenium2 (WebDriver).
Web App testing on Mobile: Allows you to record your scenarios on Firefox and replay the same on Android & iOS (Physical Device and Emulator)
New improved UI for Selective Propagation of Concepts, Project Configuration UI.

You can download Twist 2.3 here

Watch out for post on how to test your web application on mobile devices.

Twist – Let’s you get started pretty quick !

2011-07-28T20:49:00.001+05:30

I joined a Product team who creates a Software product. I joined as second QA in the team. Product has seen quite a few releases and the team has built a Testing Suite which has over 600 test scenarios. These test scenarios run on 3 OS Windows, Linux, Mac.600 tests means a well and huge structure already built in and not much of effort from my end. Oh but I then start worrying about time taken to comprehend the structure and look around how classes are organized, how are we tagging the test scenarios, how can I find what all scenarios are automated.

I used to think that automation tool sits in isolation. It’s needed when you want some test cases to automate. But we are using a tool which took away all my tension - Twist. So Twist allows me to write manual test case as well as automated ones at a single place and in a single suite. I don’t need 2 software; one to write manual tests and one to write automated tests. Well most of the testing projects have like this; write manual test cases in excel or other Test management tool and then automate it in QTP or some other tool. Twist avoids such duplication effort. That means, early in the cycle when I am testing story I can write test scenarios in Twist and can tag them as “to be automated” and with respective functionality. So down the line in QA cycle when I would get time I would start automating it and remove the tags based on our convenience.

Coming to the original problem of comprehending the Test Suite structure and adding on top of existing test cases. Twist allows you to write test cases in business language. From the above example it’s easy to comprehend that I want to create a Card with some description and verify if it shows up in the list. To you it might not sound a little confusing as to what card and what list but some one on project can easily understand it. So when I have to add further test cases, all I need to do is press Control + Space key which brings up the Auto – complete feature and help me write scenarios in a faster and more efficient way. This will bring up the list of all test steps which has been implemented in previous scenarios. So it’s easy for me to look through (refer the below image)

The whole suggestion comes up and narrows down the list based on the words I types in. When I type in multiple words only those steps comes in which has both the words present. Isn’t this a cool feature in a testing tool.

That’s why I say go ahead and give it a try. And do write to me or Twist team in case you want to share your experience with the tool.

Using Drag and Drop in Webdriver

2011-07-26T18:24:00.001+05:30

Today I was trying out to test the Drag and Drop feature provided in webdriver. First I searched for a website which allows me to perform drag and drop operations and came across a website “http://jqueryui.com/demos/”. On the top left you will see 2 items “Draggable” and “Droppable”. Those are of interest to us as of now to test the Drag and Drop feature if Webdriver.

Draggable: The draggable sections looks like this. So you have a web element which can be dragged around in the circle. API to be used for these kind of controls is

org.openqa.selenium.interactions.Actions.dragAndDropBy(WebElement source, int xOffset, int yOffset)

Sample code to drag this element to an offset is

WebElement draggable = browser.findElement(By.id("draggable"));
new Actions(browser).dragAndDropBy(draggable, 200, 10).build().perform();

Droppable: The Droppable sections looks like this. You have 2 elements i.e one draggable and the other one to drop into. API to be used for these kind of controls is

org.openqa.selenium.interactions.Actions.dragAndDrop(WebElement source, WebElement target)

Sample code to drag this element and drop into other control is

WebElement draggable = browser.findElement(By.id("draggable"));
WebElement to = browser.findElement(By.id("droppable"));
new Actions(browser).dragAndDrop(draggable, to).build().perform();

Hope this information helps, do write me in case you face any issues !

Note: I tried the above script on Firefox Version 5 and Internet Explorer Version 9.

Google + (Send Feedback link) – Tester’s View

2011-07-18T20:26:00.000+05:30

First thing: what compelled me to write this was “Send Feedback” feature on Google +. I assume you would be knowing a little about Bug Logging/Tracking tool. I have used quite few too. Pretty much all of them seems to work in isolation. Isolation as in you have a application to test and you found a bug. So you launch the Bug logging application and do a bunch of things:

1. Write the best describing short and concise Title.
2. Write the Steps: (How to reproduce this? What was expected? What really happened?)
3. Take a relevant screenshot and highlight the problem in that (A Picture speaks thousand words !)
4. Set Feature, Priority, Risk etc.

I felt I found a bug in Google + and I thought of sending it to them. I clicked on the “Send Feedback” link, so my whole page greys out and a small UI is popped up in right. By default “Highlight” is selected. So you just have to select a relevant portion of the UI where you think the Bug is and describe the issue in the textbox provided.

When I clicked on “Preview”, it launched a pop up with all the relevant details like the one you see in image below (Annotations, Page Information, Browser Information, Product Information, Page Structure). What else I could have wanted as a Tester :)
Amazing idea for a the next killer Bug logging tool. I also came across another tool BugHerd, brilliant concept (check it out !).

Great tool from Google guys.

Impressive Google +

2011-07-16T23:09:00.001+05:30

I am not a big Facebook fan but used to spend quite some time on it by looking into some scraps, some videos, laughing on comments, liking some comments (remember the Like button).

Got the news of Google +. Requested few colleagues to invite me so that I can join the Google + league (which is not yet opened publicly).

Reaction in first few minutes: wow what a neat application. No UI frills as you can see below. Default landing is on Home page, next icon is for Photos (Photos from your circles),next is your Profile, and the last one is most talked about Circles. Clicking on Circle will show you People in your circle, People who’ve added you, People you can find and invite.

Circle is quite an innovation in Google +. Not everyone I have in my Facebook friend list are at same proximity. Some are college friends, some are colleagues, some are friend’s friend and many more like this. I feel Google +has understood it properly and they have created Circles as a solution. It helps you maintain your privacy. I have a circle of Colleagues, circle of friends who studied together, circle of people who I don’t know directly.

So when I write something on my wall, I may not intend to share with the whole world, and Google + just allows me to control this. Also I can choose my videos and posts not to re-shared and commented by anyone. On the contrary on Facebook, comments make you little popular and adds spice to your social life on Facebook.

I wish Google could release an Enterprise version of Google +, it can replace the typical email stuff. Imagine like this, you have your whole org on Google +, you can have a Circle of “Dev Team”, “Test Team”, “Project Management”, “Release Management”, “Customer Support”. Best thing even if someone is not in your circle you can just add their email along with your selected circle.

They still need to add some more cool features, apart from the 3 shown below.

One good thing which I noticed on signing in to Google + is that they made good use of some of the user data they have. They pull in the data I have in my Google Profiles to create my Google + profile. Also they let you see how your profile would appear to others.

They have Gtalk enabled and in case you are a active gmail user, you will feel really happy ! So I would say just try it out.

Send me an email if you need an invite on Google +.

In a comfortable zone… sad but it’s reality of my life!

2011-07-02T22:12:00.001+05:30

Every morning I get up, I generally prefer to pick up the news paper (Times of India) and want to read something good. Good about the country, good about what we as people are doing, good about what government is doing for the country, some good articles in the speaking tree section, some good international news and some good financial news. Ahhhh… this seems like as if I am into some dream land and very much optimistic about everything. Well I am a little optimistic, in fact a little more than all of us (I feel).

I open the news paper and I read “Life in Tihar: Tea with jail official, chatting with pals”, “CBI books babu for Rs. 400 cr. loss”, “HC stays tree cutting along Sankey Road”, “Maria Susairaj set to walk free”, “Stray canines maul baby to death in city”. Well these are headlines of a national daily newspaper. My first instant reaction: Bloody hell ! Why do people bend in front of politicians, why shouldn’t they be treated as other criminals are. Next reaction: CBI seems to be quite powerful. But who will pay for this Rs. 400 cr. loss? Will it come to us in some ways of direct or indirect tax ? I still remember that the total bill on a dinner (occasion was my wedding anniversary) was Rs. 2700/- for just 3 persons. Out of that Rs. 2700/-, around Rs. 500/- was just taxes (Service charge, VAT, Cess). Well I am not complaining about Rs. 2700/- but about Rs. 500/- which was put on bill against some tax. Just because I earn 70,000/- a month doesn’t mean that I should be careless about my spending. Next reaction: Court can understand tree cutting and has issued a stay but the human killing is not understood properly. Maria Susairaj case is really a rarest of the rare case sighting the punishment which is meted out to the killer duo.

I was expecting some good news to be happy about as a citizen, to feel proud of being Indian. Sorry we follow the same old principle “Bad news sells more than good news”, I guess would be the reply of news paper publishing company and news channel. I think where am I in the whole scene ? What is there for me in the newspaper? I see an advertisement on the bottom right section of the newspaper “Brigade Showcase 2011”, some property expo by Brigade Group. That’s where I am ! I am a typical Indian citizen, who works in an IT company and dream to buy a good car, have good house, earn some money to live a little comfortable life. From Mon-Fri I am less worried about anything else on this earth, because my priorities are software development, testing, release etc. I have my own deadlines to meet, that is my job and I may not be most happiest when I do this but I get paid for this.

Saturday and Sunday I hang up those boots and become a normal citizen who thinks little beyond than his comfort zones, who is bothered about what his happening in his country, who is bothered about government performance, who is bothered about news in neighbourhood. On these 2 days I think I wish I could be doing something different, I could be making a little wider impact on people around me and also I could give something back to the society.

I see the problem in a different way: problem is not Congress government neither BJP nor the corrupt IAS officer. Problem is decline in the moral of the people, moral of the society. Congress, BJP, IAS officer, they are all composed of individuals. As an individual, I have compromised my honesty, as an individual I have become more greedy, as an individual I have downgraded myself morally. Nothing else on earth will force you to commit crime than your inner self who pushes you to these things.

My problem is I think these things only on Saturday and Sunday, because from mon-fri I am in my comfortable zone. I go to office, sit in air conditioned office with transparent glasses which helps me shield myself from what is happening outside. It’s sad but it’s reality. On mon-fri I still pay attention to those advertisement which come on bottom right, because they have been made to be a part of my so called “Social dream”.

How to install Webdriver on Android Emulator on Windows

2011-06-29T15:25:00.002+05:30

Following my previous post, I needed to install Webdriver on Android Emulator. I have Windows 7 installed and most of the instructions were for Linux, so I thought this might be helpful.

So even this is pretty straight forward. Let’s run through the steps I followed to install Webdriver:

Download “android-server-2.0.2rc3.apk ” from the following location http://code.google.com/p/selenium/downloads/list.
Copy the above downloaded file into folder “C:\Program Files\Android\android-sdk\platform-tools”
Run the “Command Prompt” as administrator.
Execute “cd C:\Program Files\Android\android-sdk\platform-tools”
Execute the command “adb install android-server-2.0.2rc3.apk”
We also need to set up Port forwarding, run the command “adb forward tcp:8080 tcp:8080"
This will make the android server available at “http://localhost:8080/wd/hub”
Confirm the following settings on your emulator : Settings -> Applications -> Development -> Check "USB debugging", "Stay Awake" and "Allow mock locations".
Launch the emulator, it will have Webdriver installed. When you launch the Webdriver, it will confirm “jetty started”

How to install Android Emulator on Windows

2011-06-28T19:36:00.004+05:30

As part of my testing work, I am currently working on using webdriver to test on Android. So I had to install Android Emulator on Windows 7. Below are the sequential steps and I hope it will ease some pain on getting Android emulator on your Windows 7 box.

Download the installer from http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html

Install it to a location (like: C:\Program Files\Android)
Launch “SDK Manager.exe”
It will launch a “Android SDK and AVD Manager”. By default “Installed packages” will be highlighted. On the pop up “Choose Packages to Install”, there will be some packages selected already. Go ahead with the “Install”.

4. Once it is done, select “Virtual Devices” to create one for you. Click on “New” and enter some name. Target as “Android 2.2 – API Level 8”. Select Size as “512” and “Built-in” to be “WVGA854” and click on “Create AVD”.

5. Once done select the Virtual device you created and click on Start. You can find the “Start” button on the right panel in the above shown image. Clicking “Start” will launch another pop-up, just say “Launch” and proceed.

Technology Adoption Lifecycle

2011-06-23T19:21:00.001+05:30

Though there are many things I wish I could write and share with you all (what I learn at IIM), but I found this really worth and couldn’t resist. I am thinking of sharing some learning with you all going forward.

Today I had a class on subject “Management of Tech Products” and Professor suggested a book “Crossing the Chasm” by Geoffrey A. Moore. Probably if you are associated with Product development and Management, this book would be a great source of knowledge and insight into product management. I would definitely recommend this!

As per the book mentioned above, there is something called “Technology Adoption Lifecycle“ model and it actually shows that a product marketer should focus one user group at a time. These are 5 different user segments who actually uses the product at different stages. Below attached is the picture of the same.

Leaving you with this so that you feel like knowing more about it ! (Food for thought)