BWST-1

2-5-09 Bangalore.
A lucky day for me, to personally meet some well-known personality of testing field.
Yes, you guessed it right I am talking about the BWST-1 conference held in Bangalore.
I had a great time out there in matter meeting people, learning, understanding testing, problems faced by testers etc…
I apologies for the delay in posting about BWST-1, actually the learning from this conference was equal to a big pool (of knowledge) and to write about my understanding from this pool it’s some what equal to catch a fish bare handed.
Anyways, following is my experience for/in BWST-1.

The day began with a general introduction between all presented (15) testers. Introduction was pretty much important to know each other [and to target people easily :-) (just kidding)]

India’s first ever Software testing conference BWST-1 was attended by, Ajay Balamurugadas, Aishwarya D Shukla, Guruprasad, Manjunath, Rahul Verma, Rahul Mirakhur, Shrini Kulkarni, Manoj Nair, Ravisurya, Santhosh Tuppad, Raghu Sahay, Sharath Byregowda, Pradeep Soundararajan and off course ME.

We were given three color cards 1. Red 2. Green 3. Blue.
Red- to stop every one and you speak your point.
Green- to add some interesting point.
Blue- to start a new thread.
Being our first time, using these cards were a bit confusing task but, after a while everybody started understanding the basic fundas of how to use these cards.

Moving on to presentations,
Presenter - Ajay Balamurugadas, Topic - Rapid Software Testing (changing the way of testing).
Ajay’s experience is experienced by almost all fresh testers, he says when he was new organization gave a template and set of test case which had to be executed nothing else, no other conditions or no other thoughts to be executed.
A new one has to follow this orders but, he didn’t found thing working so what he did is except those test cases, tried a different angle of testing, exploratory testing and unbelievably error/bug flowed like running water.
[Now, it doesn’t mean that only change in angle (exploratory testing) bought these error/bugs but, it’s a tester who should understand his perfect angle and utilize it in a correct direction.] Target achieved but, when testers achieve their target questions raise and that is what happened, now ajay communicated and tried to explain every one how/why error/bugs generated.
There after, ajay became the bug hunter of his organization. (Everybody wanted a piece of ajay for testing)
Nice move isn’t it?
Moral of this presentation-
1. Always move in a direction in which you are perfect.
2. Communicate or stand only when you have enough evidence to prove something.
(Detail description and discussion of this presentation click here)


Presenter - Manoj Nair, Topic - An attempt for better testing.
Manoj’s experience was all about testing a product in every direction which was really appreciated in his organization but, slowly and some how a problem created of managing data. Sometime questions rose to him saying how to manage data and what mode of presentation would be better. This was a real time question for testers. Manoj found solution for him, which is session based test management.
A question rose in between this presentation – Limits of data providing after which it becomes an overflow of data (by- Aishwarya)
This actually gave a different angle for the discussion, according to me this question is yet unanswered.
Moral of this presentation-
Data’s are meant for informing you only if, you manage them.


Presenter - Manjunath, Topic - Review of Bug Reports.
Frankly speaking first few minutes were bouncer for me coz I didn’t get the idea of reviewing the bug report.
Then slowly slowly when manjunath shared his experience that time my ideas got cleared actually then I understood the real purpose of reviewing a bug report.
Shrini sir explained me or you can say gave examples on this topic. (While walking towards the restro for lunch)
Now, I think reviewing the bug report is something which every tester should practice.


Presenter - Rahul Verma, Topic - Confession of a Fallible Tester.
What a presenter? Seriously he reminded me, my graduations first presentation but, his presentation was more professional kind off, amazing presentation.
Rahul verma didn’t present a way of testing instead he presented his mistakes which taught testing to him.
One of his experience:- In one of his assignments rahul’s senior gave him a tool and said use this tool for testing coz this is the best tool existing. He accepted that and tested with that tool but simultaneously he use to search reasons which makes this tool tagged best tool.
He shared his experiences with us which were more than a motivating presentation.
Rahul’s presentation didn’t taught how to test but he taught to learn from your mistakes
Can any one motivate you to make mistakes, rahul did seriously speaking, this presentation charged me to make more mistakes only if, I learn from it.
Moral of this presentation-
Nobody can educate you unless and until you want to learn.


Presenter - Rahul Mirakhur, Topic - Career in testing.
Rahul presented two questions why testing and why not testing. He gave out quite a few example how he tackle people with a question why testing.
According to him each and every one is a tester and every one like to explore, which was very true.
People at a certain level in IT sector do nothing just manage the given task and while managing they do not get a chance to live or to do what they want to do. I think this actually happens in real world.
Then he talked about how earlier developers were forced to do testing which created this mental blockage.
People have created a mental block either they live with it or leave it.
Moral of this presentation-
Every negative side has a positive angle for someone.



Presenter - Shrini Kulkarni, Topic - Test Automation, mindset, skill and people.
Seriously guys, I found him a pool of knowledge covered with a small brain.
Shrini discussed about his experiences in automation testing, meeting different people with different mind set plus with different skills.
What I learn from him,
Test automation- automation is more than just scripting.
People – many with many ideas.
Skill- to working differently
Mindset- keep on changing your ideas.
Moral of this presentation-
Testing lost its real meaning when it was brought to India.


Presenter - Sharath Byregowda, Topic - Session Based Test Management.
He shared his experience as how he changed the way of testing and achieved something which was unknown or unexpected.
You must read his blog Here, this would give you a clear idea about how he tested a product with his team and managed to create great result in testing.
Moral of this presentation-
Do what ever you want but manage things to make you understand.


Clock slowly and steadily moved on to 6.00pm which was the indication of stop.
Being very frank I was exhausted just because testing was more than testing out there was more than my expectations but, enjoyed it truly.
We ended up our BWST-1 conference on a good note- promising to be back soon.
On that note we left the premises to enjoy the evening out in Bangalore we went to a mall, to fill in up some food stuff. The process of hanging out got carried out for 3 hours and around 9.00pm we left towards are respective places.

Questions to an interviewer..

Sunday meetings.
On this Sunday every one was cool and calm (My developer friends), but the topic wasn’t.
One of my developer friend started abusing the interviewer we all were clueless then,
abuser said: guys I had been to an interview day before yesterday and the interviewer was so dum.
I: (interrupted him and questioned) How can you say that?
Abuser: He asked me a question which he didn’t knew so he was trying his hands on me or you can say he was playing with all interviewee life, does that soundzz good.
That’s it! That’s how we got our topic for this Sunday obviously “INTERVIEWS”.

As usual we had a bad (I mean great) debate on this topic, following is my observation and learning from this Sunday.

Interviewer a great personality who knows every thing, this is what interviewee thinks.
On the other hand it wouldn’t be wrong if I say while taking interview, interviewer changes their personality (splits) and act what they are not.
Its we who make an interview either boring or interesting, now you might have a question what is boring interview and what is interesting interview.
First let me tell you, the meaning of interview “a conversation in which two well-known person share their views, knowledge, etc” but do we really follow this, No, I don’t think so.
Coming back to boring and interesting part, when only interviewer questions and only interviewee answers this is a boring interview. Interesting, when interviewer and interviewee cross questions each other and both try to find solution automatically this becomes interesting one.
I don’t understand why people get scared of interviews, in fact if we see the other way round, it’s a great opportunity to meet some one who is more experienced and might have better knowledge.

Again questions raised which were a bit controversial or one which were left with silence.
I promise my self to ask these questions to my interviewers. I’ll seriously like to do that because I want to see the difference between answers of two interviewers.

QUESTIONS...

1. What makes you decide the eligibility for a tester?
2. What are the basic qualities you expect in a tester even when the word quality cannot be defined?
3. What is the definition of quality for you?
4. How do you judge (differentiate) testers ability?
5. How do you motivate testers?
6. What is your definition of software testing?
7. Do you really implement your definition in your testing?
8. What is a tester’s job except testing, according to you?
9. Why do we need a tester?
10. Does a tester add value to your product?
11. What is your qualification and designation in this company?
12. How testing standards are created and maintained?
13. What made you choose testing field?
14. According to you who are a perfect tester?
15. One thing that you don’t like about a fresh and experienced testers.

This questions are not just for testing Profession, you can interchange the word "testing" to your profession and try to get answers for yourself.
Please leave back your comments if you get an answer for a single question, from your comments someone or I might get educated, so leave back your comments to educate others...

Traveling Bombay to Bangalore...

This post is truly dedicated to all the new members I met, while traveling to Bangalore.
Firstly, I would like to thanks Raghu Sahay from Pune for joining me in my journey, and without him this event of Bangalore would have been a difficult task for me. And thanks to testing which added new friends in my life.

Getting back into flashback, my journey began at 11.00am from Bombay, I had to catch a train from Pune (to Bangalore) so caught a bus to pune. While traveling in bus, (to pune)
I was accompanied by a sweet woman, woman because I thought she was married but after some chat I discovered that she is yet a girl (unmarried) now you must be thinking what made me believe that she is married woman actually, that girl had a great perception about our Indian culture which usual girl wouldn’t talk about, difference between different mindset all this topic prior to my discover made me believe that she is married, which was very wrong. You know guys what I appreciate the most about that girl, she is working even though her dad is at one of the precious post in government. Keeping that in mind and supporting her own self esteem, she’s working Great isn’t it ?

Now, I am feeling proud to be an Indian because mindsets are changing.
We shared lots of information, thoughts and views. Thanks to that girl else my journey would have been a great bore for me.

I met raghu who was waiting at the Pune station. Unfortunately, are tickets were not confirmed and we were hopeless coz while booking our tickets we got a waiting nos. 100 but, at that point of time are current status was 3 you cannot imagine how bad that nos. 3 was for us. We felt so bad, we left behind by just 3 seats.

For few minutes we thought lets get back to our respective homes. But then, raghu approached me and said do you like adventure, I: Yes. Raghu: so let go adventure is waiting for us and pointed towards the train filled with people (summer vacations).
You know guys we even tried the mode of corruption towards TTE to pull out at least one seat but, traveling without seats was our destiny. So, NO seats yaks.
From that point we began our search, search for little space, some extra space where in we both can place are head. Believe me, I was horrified because journey of 18 hours and no confirm seats (this was my first time).

After a long discussion finally our journey began and some how we managed to settle down. After few minutes our good time started, start to end of the journey we traveled, with all the royalties what a prince has, kind words and the way we act or responded to people around us brought this change. You know guys what was the funniest part, we both were sleeping half way on some others seat without any argument (really great adventure). Some one has said it very truly “humans are always hungry to listen kind words”

Finally, we reached Bangalore. We decided to stay at Raghu’s friend’s house where in I met his 4 friends, these 4 guys were damn fantastic personalities I felt like meeting my friends after a long time.
Let me have the pleasure to introduce you these 4 guys.

1. Yogesh (puppy) 2. Vikas 3. Sid (piddi) 4. Cirag.

I found puppy and vikas as entertainer, I mean you’ll never feel bored if you are around these two. Talking about sid and cirag these two are the observer, they’ll always analysis you first what category you belong if you matched their mentality then boom lets have fun. You can say they had a supporting spirit, supporting each other. I have met many friend groups, friend circle many, but this was my best experience in my life and I wouldn’t forget these four friends in my life. Seriously, what a supporting spirit, hats off friends. Friends you’ll really rock together.

You might have seen friends fighting and breaking their friendship, these guys also fight but, the next morning its like yesterday was a night mare or a bad part or a hurdle which we have crossed successfully shake hands and move ahead, Great yaar, what an attitude.
I enjoyed a lot because it was like a dream because few guys don’t get a chance to live like this, I mean with friends and all. I am one of those unlucky guys.

Days went like cool breeze and we headed back to our home town.

OOPpss !! I forgot to tell you the main purpose of going to Bangalore. I was supposed to attend BWST-1 conference. A conference all about software testing, my next post will be on that and what I learnt from others presentation.