Welcome back next year Martin, James and Torbjörn

@Joris – The note-taking was not in focus at this testlab, still there were some who were new to it that saw it used in different ways. For coming testlabs I think we should focus extra on that. I’d like to have that and bug reports as a focus area. We will see where I end up next for a testlab. Thanks for you feedback.

Interesting article. Do you think it may be possible to expand on note-taking techniques? I believe testing has a lot of parallels with Grounded theory; testing draws inferences (theories, if you will) from the subject under study. In grounded theory note-taking is quite important. Do you have info on which tools were used and, more interesting, on how, why and what people wrote down? What were the different styles? As I see it note-taking is one of the crucial aspects of our craft we need to become good at.

Thanks and best regards,

Joris

Very cool article on your experiences with the Let’s TestLab. I think it was such a success because of the high density of context-driven people at Let’s Test.

Subtle, how you declare that you had a last beer on the first day and then you added “at least for me”.

I am also very glad the lab had so many participants on the second day, in spite of our confusing coaching intrusion

You bring up an interesting point concerning the traditional role of a test manager. I think we should reconsider emergent structures more often. I have experienced myself that some people in companies are fear-driven and unfortunately would not allow such experiments.

But the most interesting point in your post was you bringing up the question if context-driven testers ask questions “just because they can”. Might some questions just arise out of the need to impress? Is it just the joy of asking smart questions that drive their formulation? Certainly something to think about a bit more.

Anyway, congratulations for making a good test lab possible.

Best & Hopefully meet you again soon
Ilari

I think we need to find ways to influence ALM tools makers to support the diversity of needs situated on the axis between ET and ST.
While one tool serving as silver bullet is probably too much to ask for, yet ideas out of SBTM and tool’s such as the one from @SGershon may very well be integrated in the larger as well as in free ALMs (such as XStudio), to support a more diversified approach to testing which is still manageable.
I think that if more testers will express their needs, we might soon see it incorporated within tools, which will make our life much easier.

BTW – It seems like checking is a re-use of all the ideas we had during any Learning phase during the testing process static or active stages, learning and cognitive process is used during pre-scripting/planning, as well as during ET and ST execution.

Hope we will hear about your experiments conclusions along the way,

@halperinko – Kobi Halperin

I am experimenting with how to work checks, checklists and session notes. I will know in a few months if me and my team had any use of it. I think we are always in danger of gathering the wrong kind of information which might remain unread. It is important that we try new things and see if we can change how we work.

Yes, the meaning of the potato has changed over time, from bugs more to “potential usage”.
Yes, it is a simplification (as all models) that doesn’t really describe reality. But it is a visualization that explains my core idea, and it sticks.
Yes, elaborations should be made, for instance there might be many potatos, some of them being small and very difficult to find, some of them being slippery and difficult to get hold of.

Also, at Let’s Test tutorial I handed out version 1.1 of the booklet, this is now also uploaded to this web site – http://www.thetesteye.com/papers/TheLittleBlackBookOnTestDesign.pdf