August 3, 2012
Dear Everyone:
The Big Test is tomorrow.
The Test that I’ve been working on for the past two
months now.
It’s actually called
Regression Testing.
The software is already in use.
People use it every day to make requests (please provide a desk
and chair for office number such and such) and to report problems
(octopus in the Ladies Room!!!)
That was what they call Functional Set One, or
“FS1” for short.
Functional Set Two (FS2), the part we’re working on
now, involves a lot of financial shenanigans and that means a lot of
reprogramming.
Trouble is, when you change part of the
programming, it can result in “bugs” in the original programming.
(Also known as the
Ripple Effect.)
So you have to test not only the “new” stuff, but the “old” stuff
as well.
So this Saturday, they will copy all the “old”
stuff and the “new” stuff into Production and we will have the one day
to test everything so they can “reset” it all on Sunday so people can go
back to using it on Monday.
With only one day (8 hours hypothetically) to complete the testing, you
want to make darn sure that the tests don’t have “bugs” built into them,
which is a large part of what I’ve been working on since the beginning
of June.
Now, there’s a whole group of programmers called
“Business Process Optimization” (BPO) who have insisted, from the
beginning, that they should
be the ones to do the testing.
Sort of like, they don’t trust anyone else to test their work.
And they’ve known for months that Regression Testing will take
place on the first Saturday in August.
Guess who’s not “available” this Saturday.
Consequently, I have “volunteered” to work
tomorrow, to help out with the testing.
Actually, it works out for me since I didn’t work
last Monday, that being the day that “Jeannie” and I flew home from
New
York. So I will get five
days of work in this week after all.
Instead of getting something called “overtime”.
I haven’t been paid “overtime” in about 25 years,
so I’m used to it.
Not exactly sure which tests, if any, I’ll actually
be performing. Test Scenario
Number Five (all 435 steps of it) is the one that I spent so much time
on in the past, trying to make it intelligible to the “average” person.
This week, I’ve been “revising” all the other tests, making sure
they don’t tell you to do something that the programmers changed a month
ago. They (the tests) all
still “jump around like a cricket on a griddle”, but I’ve decided to let
that be for now. “Ludmilla”
likes it that way.
Also, “Ludmilla” (who the project manager told me
yesterday “employs non-linear thinking”) finally took a look at my
“revised” version of Test Scenario Number Five this morning.
She happily spent all day today “revising” (i.e., “shredding”)
all the work I did before to make the “scenario” intelligible.
Good luck to whoever gets “Number Five” tomorrow.
And I’ve already been informed that my Security
Badge has been authorized to let me in the building tomorrow (always a
good start) and they will provide breakfast and lunch.
So, downside: a very
short weekend. Upside:
free food.
We’ll see how it all goes.
Love, as always,
Pete
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