As I split my testing time between two projects / systems at work, it's fun to notice the differences in the projects. The other project is a new product, originally with very little features but as usual, growing with time. It' not yet in production, but will be in about a month. Being there on-time has been a great experience.
Since I started with the project early in the development, we talked of what information would be most relevant, and that guided what I reported. I could always use more time on this project, but the other project with already-in-production setting also needed attention. So I'd just try and do the best I can with the time available. One of the things that was deemed not so relevant was certain types of typos - in database contents. I learned to skip them without being too much annoyed.
Then with the new features being added, in came a reporting feature, that would take the contents and show them in a deliverable that is clearly intended for our customers. Previously the interfaces I had were for internal use, but this one changed the game.
I talked with the project manager about the typos, and after the first sentence, he said they're not relevant. I smiled, and told him that I find it funny how my mind works: it was natural to pass them, while they were visible on the internal interfaces, but now that my mind is set up for the idea that we give THIS to our customers, I have this feeling that they may think that typos, especially a large number of them, is sort of unprofessional. I could see from the project managers face that something clicked, and he continued, not with a "but" but with "and" - and it would be so much easier to fix those before going live, as there will be dependencies on stuff created when we get this out.
In just a few sentences we changed from "not relevant" to "good idea". And really, my mind works so that when I recognize the type of the user, I notice different types of issues.
Since I started with the project early in the development, we talked of what information would be most relevant, and that guided what I reported. I could always use more time on this project, but the other project with already-in-production setting also needed attention. So I'd just try and do the best I can with the time available. One of the things that was deemed not so relevant was certain types of typos - in database contents. I learned to skip them without being too much annoyed.
Then with the new features being added, in came a reporting feature, that would take the contents and show them in a deliverable that is clearly intended for our customers. Previously the interfaces I had were for internal use, but this one changed the game.
I talked with the project manager about the typos, and after the first sentence, he said they're not relevant. I smiled, and told him that I find it funny how my mind works: it was natural to pass them, while they were visible on the internal interfaces, but now that my mind is set up for the idea that we give THIS to our customers, I have this feeling that they may think that typos, especially a large number of them, is sort of unprofessional. I could see from the project managers face that something clicked, and he continued, not with a "but" but with "and" - and it would be so much easier to fix those before going live, as there will be dependencies on stuff created when we get this out.
In just a few sentences we changed from "not relevant" to "good idea". And really, my mind works so that when I recognize the type of the user, I notice different types of issues.
