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Category: Measurement

Three ways to make metrics suck less

Everybody loves to hate metrics. I get it. There are a lot of terrible metrics out there in the software development and testing world. People still propose counting commits or test cases as a measure of productivity. It’s garbage. But I also believe that measuring something can be a useful way to understand aspects of… Read more

What should the ratio of automated to exploratory testing be?

I popped into an online panel about testing today, and a question along these lines was asked: what is the ratio between automated testing and exploratory testing at your company? I get the gist of what is being asked here of course, and wouldn’t get too pedantic in answering it in the moment, but this… Read more

Three notes on Value Streams

These are some scattered notes from a DevOps Toronto meetup earlier this year. These are highlights from a presentation by Steve Pereira on value stream mapping. I’ve been finding making value streams explicit, whether formal or not, a key part of my role evolving from testing to DevOps more generally. One of the basic strategic… Read more

Rethinking velocity

I’ve been thinking about the concept of “velocity” in software development the last few days, in response to a couple cases recently where I’ve seen people express dislike for it. I can understand why, and the more I think about it the more I think that the concept does more harm than good. When I… Read more

Testability as observability and the Accessibility Object Model

I attended a talk today by Rob Dodson on some proposals for the Accessibility Object Model that are trying to add APIs for web developers to more easily manipulate accessibility features of their apps and pages. Rob went through quite a few examples of the benefits the proposed APIs would bring, from simple type checking… Read more