I built an XP VPC a couple weeks ago and finally decided to do something with it.

I’m currently installing Orcas Beta 1 (the Pro edition).  Hopefully it’ll be done installing sometime today. 

A discussion recently came up on my project about writing test scripts.

I’m not talking about TDD here, i’m talking about good old fashioned end-user test scripts – a list of steps to get from point A to point B with each hitting a piece of application functionality.

Some back-story:
As I’ve mentioned, my current project really has no requirements.  Yea, we have a couple use cases and a pretty large list of “issues/requirements” listed in our issue tracker, but nothing like Eric talked about in his article.

The Project Manager is also acting as the Business Analyst on this project (this isn’t something I necessarily agree with and I could write a couple of blog posts on that topic alone, but I digress).

Ok, so the PM has been meeting with the client for months and says he knows *exactly* what the customer wants, but he refuses to write anything down in a formal way.  As I mentioned in my previous post, I tend to get requests via email or IM, although I’ve become much more of a hardass about it and tell him if it’s not in the issue tracker, I’m not working on it.

Ok, so given all that, the PM/BA and I got into a slight disagreement about a week or two ago about test scripts.  His testing is always by the seat of his pants and there really is not repeatable sequence he uses when testing.  My request to him was to create test scripts so that someone else could run through the same tests without deviation.

The PM:
His argument is this: he can’t write test scripts without a *working* application.  He has said that whenever he starts writing test scripts and finds a bug, he can’t proceed with writing his scripts.  There are major pieces of the application that are working, although some areas are buggy.

The Tech Lead (me):
My argument is this: He doesn’t *need* a working application to write scripts. The scripts should be written based on what the app SHOULD do, not what it currently does.  He should have a script that lists steps A,B and C.  If for some reason, he can’t get to step C, then his test has failed and he needs to submit an issue back to the developers.

My second argument is that once he writes a series of test scripts, we can seriously look at automating some of them.

Neither of us has ever held a true “QA” position, so I’m not sure.  The books I’ve read say you should write your tests from the spec, but since we don’t have anything like that, he needs to use his extensive knowledge of what the system is supposed to be.

So, does it sound like I’m way off base here? 

A great article by Eric Sink on Requirements.

Requirements are one thing my current project is lacking to a high degree and it really sucks. 

What’s worse about the current situation is that the client plans on taking this product to market and yet no matter how much we try to educate them, they continue to plod on in the same haphazard manner (which of course frustrates the development team, which in turn frustrates the PM because he doesn’t see what the big deal is). 

So, looking Eric’s article, I can say “Yep, yep, yep, and yep” to the bullet points under the “Bad Requirements” section.  My project has Missing Requirements, Unclear Requirements, Non-prioritized requirements and missing anti-requirements. 

Requirements come to us in the form of the PM saying, “the client wants X and he wants it by next week.”  My typical response back to him is, “well, it would have been nice to know that WEEKS ago when we implemented W, because X is building on W and W was never designed to work that way, this change is going to .”

 Sorry for venting…it’s been a frustrating few weeks and I”m looking forward to wrapping this project up.

I was researching an NHibernate problem today and after googling, I landed here.  Typical response: “search the forums”.  GRRRR…ok, so I hit the search page, entered my criteria and hit search.  D’oh!  I need to fill out the CAPTCHA section?!?  WTF?  I’m searching for cryin’ out loud!

Ok, not only was I annoyed at the fact they needed it to begin with, what the hell kind of design puts the entry box and the image so far apart?  I ended up try about 5 times before I found one I could actually read and enter correctly.

Someone please explain why in the hell they’d need CAPTCHA on a search form? 

Well, it didn’t go quite as expected, but yesterday afternoon around 5pm, I finally hit level 70!

I was on my way to turn in a quest (which would have taken me over the edge), but decided I wanted to be fighting when I leveled (it’d make a much better screenshot than me standing at an NPC)  Anyway, so I stealthed and was within a second of hitting the elemental when I leveled due to discovering a new area!  D’oh!  So much for my action shot. 

My pockets were overflowing with about 1950 gold, so I immediately dropped 900 of it for my flying mount.

When I arrived at WCC this morning, I met up with my friends Mike H. and Dean C.

After a quick run through registration to grab our name tags, t-shirts and some swag, we headed to our first session of the day – Architecting the User Experience presented by Josh Holmes.  I always enjoy watching Josh speak and today was no different.  His talk really made me wish my project wasn’t so far along because I’d love to incorporate some of the things I saw during his presentation.  Oh well, maybe the next project.

For the second session, the three of us split up.  I stayed in room 275 (which BTW, sucked as far as comfort goes) and sat through Dustin Campbell’s ‘Hardcore Reflection’.  OMG, ummm…..yea.  It was a very cool talk, but damn….he was right when he titled it ‘hardcore’.  He definitely knows his stuff inside and out.

Mike, Dean and I (btw, neither of them blog, so they suck) had lunch together.  At one point, Jason stopped by our table and we talked WoW for a few minutes (Mike and I gave him a hard time about unnatural love for PVE).   After lunch, the three of us headed up to room 210 so Mike could setup and prepare for his IIS 7 talk.  Mike has given this talk before, but it’s normally a 3+ hour discussion that he had to cram into 65 minutes.

Dean and I abandonded him to sit through Mark Miller’s intro to WPF and Expression Blend.  Mark is always entertaining, especially with Dustin heckling him from the audience.  This is the 3rd or 4th time I’ve seen WPF demoed and it continues to be something I want to dive in to.  Of course, this holds true for all of the W* technologies — WPF, WCF, WF.

Mark’s first demo didn’t work as he expected, so going with the flow, he announced very loudly:

I SUCK, I SUCK, I SUCK

I was surprised to see all of the presenters running Vista.  I still can’t bring myself to install it.  Maybe when this project wraps up I’ll find the time.

Expression Blend looks very cool.  Mark continued to have issues with the demos, but he definitely had fun with the situation.

The three of us got back together for Marks’ second session about WPF/WCF.  The demo Mark came up with was very cool – an air hockey game.  The only problem I had with this session (at the least the very beginning) is that Mark went through the code before showing the demo which made it tough to get into.  Once he showed the actual game running, things made a lot more sense.

The final session we all decided to sit in was Keith Elder’s talk on Smart Clients.  This was the first time I’ve seen Keith speak and I’m glad I decided to go (even if he did break the projector).    It was a very interesting talk and it truly does make me miss doing WinForms development.  Hopefully I can get back to it soon.  Of course, watching his presentation also made me wish I could turn back the clock on my current project, but oh well, not much I can do about it now.  The only complaint I had about this session was NOT related to the content or Keith’s delivery, but environmental conditions.  The room was WAY TOO FREAKIN’ HOT!

Overall, this years Day of .NET was awesome!  BTW, I absolutely LOVED the way they did the book raffle!  Instead of all of us standing in a room waiting for our numbers to be called, they pre-drew the numers and posted them in the hall leading to room 275 (where the main raffle took place).  All we had to do was look for the last 3 digits from our tickets.  If they were posted, we got a book from that table.  Soooooo much better than the “old way”.    I’m hoping upcoming events follow this method.

So, to wrap-up, it was good to see Mike, Dean, Dan, Joe and Jason again.  I also saw Vinay (a former co-worker) and John (a former student).

If you’ve never been to an event like this, find the time to do it!

Good stuff so far!

I’m taking notes on my work tablet, so hopefully I’ll have them posted sometime today.

We got into Ann Arbor around 6:30 and checked into our room (myfamily came with me this time)  The kids love staying in  hotels(especially when there’ s a pool), so they were really excited when we told them.

After dinner with my family, I met up with Dan Hounshell and Joe Wirtley.  We talked tech and swapped war stories for a couple hours.  Joe is also working for Pillar, so it was nice to talk to someone else and see that my project isn’t unique. 

I’m looking forward to tomorrow…I’m thinking:

Session 1: Architecting the user experience – Josh Holmes
Session 2: Hardcore Reflection – Dustin Campbell
Session 3: Make fun of Mike Hacker during his IIE7 session (Mike and I go WAAAAAY back — damn, something like 14 years now)

Wait…let’s see…session 3….Mike vs Mark Miller.  Yea, I’m gonna go see Mark Miller talk about WPF.   Sorry Mike, but you suck.

Session 4: Rocking with WPF and WCF (again, Mark Miller)
Session 5: Not sure….I’m gonna play it by ear

Oh, while I’m on the subject, I had to cancel my trip to the West Michigan Day of .NET.  Instead of hanging out with geeks, I’ll be welcoming home my friend Wil who has spent the last 6 months in Iraq. 

So, a few weeks ago, I wrote this post.

And then I added the nice banner to the sidebar of my blog.

And then I booked my room.

And then two days before the event, I get an email from Jason asking if I was going to register for the event. 

In the words of the great Homer J. Simpson: D’oh!

I am now officially registered. 

I’ll be staying at the Hampton Inn North – arriving Friday evening around 6 or 7.  My number is in the upper corner of my blog.  If you’re gonna be there and want to meet, let me know!

* The Event of the Year – I’ll take Jason’s word that this will be THE event of the year.