Chat History with WTANZ 3 (#marlena.compton/$1ac63c2f9b84d2b6)

Created on 2010-05-16 20:35:58.

Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:35:58: Here's the url I just opened: http://www.skype.com/go/joinpublicchat?skypename=marlena%2ecompton&topic=WTANZ%203&blob=eqUyuUDySiuG3NyfZJwRCP1-vmGdSq1t6293bRL5R3tdrYInC0-2fXwYcVg7iH5vQjeFGv-E9TN4c7C2QA
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:36:06: I can just add people as well.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:36:22: Hey Keis, can you see this chat?
Oliver Erlewein: 18:37:16: Hey your link doesn't work either
Oliver Erlewein: 18:37:26: people can't get in
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:37:35: oy
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:39:26: oh goody, I see people :) Hey guys!
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 18:39:45: Hello <ss type="smile">:)</ss>
Oliver Erlewein: 18:39:47: Hey all.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 18:39:52: Ooo, I got moved. Hi every body
Thomas Recker: 18:39:58: Hey there, now I'm in.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:39:59: I'll just be a minute and try and round up the others....
Keis: 18:41:03: test reply
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:41:23: Dean is here w00t!
Thomas Recker: 18:41:31: Cool. Oliver is now adding everybody to the chat?
Oliver Erlewein: 18:41:45: Haven't had a response from him yet though.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:42:33: I'm trying to help out Keis who is valiently trying to connect.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:42:44: he needs to update his Skype!
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 18:43:19: Did anyone do the EWT this w/end?
Thomas Recker: 18:43:21: What version do you need?
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 18:43:30: yes
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 18:43:37: Ah Ajay. How did it go?
Thomas Recker: 18:43:57: Please help me out. What is EWT?
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 18:44:01: Nice, we had to report to a boss this time too <ss type="wink">;)</ss>
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:44:02: Keis is on the pc vesion 4.2.0.166 is there a newer one?
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 18:44:03: WT for Europe
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 18:44:13: European Weekend Testing
Thomas Recker: 18:44:14: Thanks
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 18:44:28: report to a boss? what do you mean by that?
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 18:44:32: Well, I'm on 4.1
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:44:54: @ajay that thickens the plot.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:45:16: Maybe a firewall issue or something.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:45:19: I'm gonna go check the mailbox I set up to make sure we got everyone.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 18:45:28: Long story Richard, <a href="http://weekendtesting.com/archives/1096">http://weekendtesting.com/archives/1096</a>
Oliver Erlewein: 18:45:54: Anyway, can't see anyone else that is out there.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:46:06: Hope the others will find it....
Oliver Erlewein: 18:46:10: So....
Oliver Erlewein: 18:46:13: Session 03
Oliver Erlewein: 18:46:17: Here we go.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:46:31: As I said in the invite this is a little different.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:46:39: We're going to talk tools
Oliver Erlewein: 18:47:09: Primarily what tools everyone here uses to do their testing or to help them with anything.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:47:23: I noticed that everyone always gets excited about tools
Oliver Erlewein: 18:47:38: So I hope everyone has brought something they can share
Oliver Erlewein: 18:47:50: If not that's not bad either.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:48:16: Depending on time we can also extend this to maybe include useable websites and the such.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:48:44: Maybe we won't go the full two hours but I think this will be a lot of fun.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:48:58: So.... any questions to todays topic?
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:49:43: Are there some tools you are assuming we have already such as brainz?
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 18:49:48: Yes - can we extend the discussion to talk about a tool I am trying to locate. Someone might already know one that will fit my requirements. But only if we have time.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:49:58: I am assuming nothing.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:50:14: Well.... ok, assuming grey matter.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:50:17: ;-)
Oliver Erlewein: 18:51:06: @Richard: certainly
Oliver Erlewein: 18:52:14: I think I'll give it a start
Oliver Erlewein: 18:52:48: One thing we all need for testing is good screen capture tools
Oliver Erlewein: 18:53:01: and also tools that allow us to manipulate pics.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:53:23: The one I generally use is a tool called IrfanView (irfanview.com)
Oliver Erlewein: 18:53:52: It supports tonns of formats and has good screenschot abilities.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:54:05: it doesn't do screen capture films though
Thomas Recker: 18:54:20: Hah, trouble is quite often you must rely on the OS provided tools because you can't install stuff on your machine.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:54:24: It is extremely small as in footprint
Thomas Recker: 18:54:33: Do you need to install it?
Oliver Erlewein: 18:54:42: Exactely and IrfanView can be used without insalling it.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 18:54:51: wow
Oliver Erlewein: 18:54:54: Windows only (!)
Oliver Erlewein: 18:55:07: And since you raised it....
Keis: 18:55:13: test reply
Oliver Erlewein: 18:55:16: Hi keis
Thomas Recker: 18:55:18: That is what you coem around in corporations anyway.
Keis: 18:55:26: Hello :)
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 18:55:46: Hi Keis, welceom
Thomas Recker: 18:55:50: With Mac OS I'm quite happey with the build in features for screen capture.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:55:56: So, common thing, you're at a pc that doesn't allow you to install anything because you're not local admin.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:56:20: What comes in handy is the world of USB stick apps.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:56:41: like: http://portableapps.com/apps
Oliver Erlewein: 18:57:09: Install them to a USB stick on a PC at home or somewhere where you have access.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 18:57:23: Oliver, this is a great attribute for a screen capture tool. I think I will go to the website and download it. Its useful to have when moving between clients.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:57:24: then take that USB stick wherever you gpo and you're fine
Oliver Erlewein: 18:57:44: Have a look at http://portableapps.com/apps page
Oliver Erlewein: 18:58:00: there you can see what you can install without needing admin rights.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:58:13: For us of most interest id Firefox.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:58:24: As I will show later.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:58:25: This app called Jing looks like it does videos: http://www.jingproject.com/
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:59:01: I've heard a co-worker say she really likes using it.
Oliver Erlewein: 18:59:03: Any experience with that?
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 18:59:10: Jing is supported both on Win and Mac
Oliver Erlewein: 18:59:21: There is also SnagIT but that is commercial.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 18:59:25: I see Notepad++ there too. Does anyone use np++, and can you tell me if it auto updates if the file is updated... eg a log file
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 18:59:33: I typically use skitch: http://skitch.com/
Oliver Erlewein: 18:59:55: Yes, Notepad++ is probably one of the best free editors on windoes
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:00:22: Yes, i use SnagIt. But will trial Irfanview.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:00:23: SnagIT: http://www.techsmith.com/screen-capture.asp
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:00:27: Have you guys ever used videos for bugs before? I've quality reviewed one bug using a video and found it extremely helpful.
Thomas Recker: 19:00:27: For video on a Mac I use iShowU. It can run in a demo mode wiht a watermark inside the video
Oliver Erlewein: 19:01:03: I think Video is more for documenting your tests. i.e. being able to see how a defect occurred
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:01:04: any open source video capture tools out there, that dont require admin?
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:01:22: I use Webex Recorder for Video recording. this requires admin priviledge
Oliver Erlewein: 19:01:23: @Thomas: you got a link?
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:01:27: @oliver The video was used as a way to show repro steps.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:01:48: @Marlena: ok
Thomas Recker: 19:01:52: iShowU: http://help.shinywhitebox.com/ishowu
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:02:15: <-- just added portableapps.com to his favourites :)
Oliver Erlewein: 19:02:17: Hey can you please include links to the software you're talking about? Thanks!
Oliver Erlewein: 19:02:50: There's also a second USB apps thing called Liberkey http://www.liberkey.com but I have no experience with it.
Keis: 19:03:05: @marlena video cap is esp helpful when the steps or the effect can't be easily described... so far i've been able to use camstudio (http://camstudio.org/)
Oliver Erlewein: 19:04:12: Does anyone here use Video capture to capture whole test sessions?
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:04:37: I do and later I delete
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:04:38: @keis video somewhat elimiated the need for user to describe what they were doing when the defect happened. Of course, they still had to describe their environment.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:04:47: nope. I use paint a lot for my image capture. most keyboards have print-screen, and most PCs have paint :p
Thomas Recker: 19:04:52: Nope. Not possible to install.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:04:56: @Ajay: How is that working out for you?
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:05:36: I set myself a mission, record, pause, record, stop.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:05:43: @Richard: Booooo! And then you go and paste them in a Word Document right?????!!!! ;-)
Keis: 19:05:52: for quick image capture, i used gadwin printscreen. this automatically names the file (sequential) and saves it into a folder. that way i don't have to use printscreen and paste to Paint
Thomas Recker: 19:05:55: @Richard: The problem in my opinion is that you can only capture the whole screen or the active window in Windows.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:06:01: @Ajay: Cool. Gives me hope
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:06:05: @Richard paint is the unsung hero of windows IMHO
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:07:06: Sometimes, I feel we have to use the tool depending on what the programmer is comfortable with
Oliver Erlewein: 19:07:14: On Linux I tend to use Gimp http://www.gimp.org/
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:07:15: @Oliver, yes paste into Word, but sometimes I go all out and paste tiny screen shots into Excel
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:07:26: Paint might not be the most sophisticated, but on windows it's always there :P
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:07:34: if he ;likes just a screenshot, ms paint helps. Or if he is patient enuf, webex recording helps.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:08:03: As I said, that's why I use IrfanView. Free and available, no local admin. And it's tons better than Paint.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:08:26: Ok. I'll open the next category.... FireFox add-ons
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:08:29: As in Agile, I like as many impediments removed, therefore I like Irfanview so far, from this discussion.
Thomas Recker: 19:08:45: Another helpful tool for me in my last years testing was IETester. If you need to test IE in old versions that helps.

http://www.my-debugbar.com/wiki/IETester/HomePage
Thomas Recker: 19:08:55: Opps, not an FF add-on.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:09:11: My favourite FF add-on is Live HTTP headers https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/3829/
Oliver Erlewein: 19:09:28: It shows you HTTP request and response data
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:09:29: not a FF user <ss type="speechless">:|</ss>
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:09:45: Yes, side-by-side comparison. Is there an automatic comparison report from this program? Or is it just user-faciliated visual comparison?
Oliver Erlewein: 19:09:55: @Ajay: That's an error. FF is one of the best testing tools out there.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:10:28: We have used IE Tester with very bad results at our company
Thomas Recker: 19:10:31: I used it for manual visual comparison only so far.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:10:33: I know. Learning... would take some time ...
Oliver Erlewein: 19:10:41: IETester is not 100% accurate.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:10:47: I wish it were different.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:11:02: Ok, back to Live HTTP headers
Keis: 19:11:11: Fireshot is a Firefox add-on for screen capture. It also allows one to capture the entire page (including those that can only be seen by scrolling down).
Oliver Erlewein: 19:11:20: that tool is needed if you a) want to protocol your test execution
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:11:40: thats a great feature - to capture the whole page, not just what you can see
Oliver Erlewein: 19:11:41: b) read GET/POST requests
Oliver Erlewein: 19:11:47: so that you can automate
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:11:54: <quote author="rocketkeis" conversation="#marlena.compton/$1ac63c2f9b84d2b6" timestamp="1273993867" authorname="Keis" guid="xe87f29dd9d2845b1e518707f320d7cdd08d62f1ec6c8f2ae2e076f01632529e8"><legacyquote>[12:41:07 PM] Keis: </legacyquote>It also allows one to capture the entire page (including those that can only be seen by scrolling down).<legacyquote>

<<< </legacyquote></quote>Nice.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:12:33: Next add-on is TamperData https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/966/
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:12:38: I do a F11, fit into page, then take a snapshot <ss type="sad">:(</ss>
Oliver Erlewein: 19:12:46: Similar to Live HTTP Headers but....
Oliver Erlewein: 19:13:45: it stops requests from being sent and asks you if you'd like to change them
Oliver Erlewein: 19:14:08: that means it is one of the few tools that allows you to easily test backend-verification of websites
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:14:10: oh yes, i love this
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:14:46: great links Oliver
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:15:04: yes, I'm taking that one away for sure.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:15:07: There is a commercial tool on IE called IEwatch that does a similar thing
Oliver Erlewein: 19:15:28: http://www.iewatch.com/
Oliver Erlewein: 19:15:41: but it is $$$
Oliver Erlewein: 19:16:14: Then there is Fangs. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/402/
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:16:19: So that one's worth the $$$?
Oliver Erlewein: 19:16:48: It's good. I used it but I can get the FF one for free so....
Oliver Erlewein: 19:17:08: Ever tried to do accessability testing
Oliver Erlewein: 19:17:10: ?
Oliver Erlewein: 19:17:17: With Jaws screen reader?
Oliver Erlewein: 19:17:36: For someone that isn't blind that is purgatory (and probably for the blind too)
Oliver Erlewein: 19:18:01: Anyway Fangs shows you a written representation of what the screen reader would read.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:18:19: that is much faster for accessibility testing and much better for your sanity.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:19:11: What I am still looking for is an add-on/program that will check for colour blindness and other disabilities.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:19:43: <a href="http://www.vischeck.com">www.vischeck.com</a>
Oliver Erlewein: 19:20:13: that looks nice. i'll give it a try
Oliver Erlewein: 19:20:20: have you used it?
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:20:31: yes
Oliver Erlewein: 19:20:50: Anybody else got some nice plugins for FF?
Oliver Erlewein: 19:21:55: There is also anice add-on called FireBug, which lets you analyze HTML of a website a bit easier. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1843/
Thomas Recker: 19:22:09: @Ajay: Nice one.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:22:32: @oliver you scooped me. Was about to paste that one!
Oliver Erlewein: 19:22:41: And Yslow which is an add-on to the Firebug add-on, which lets you analyze webpages for speed. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/5369/
Oliver Erlewein: 19:22:51: Sorry Marlena
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:23:05: @oliver ha! no worries.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:23:13: Yslow is not to be confused with performance testing though.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:23:14: Yes, Iv used FireBug. ITs quite good. Although, if you are trying to find out the response time of loading a webpage, it helps if you are outside the corporate domain
Keis: 19:23:14: @Oliver, i've used that before when i tried to play around with form data. And it's also recommended by my dev friend
Keis: 19:23:23: (re: Firebug)
Oliver Erlewein: 19:24:14: So....any more add-ons? I think I've run out.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:24:41: Any other IE plug ins or Chrome stuff? I know pretty much nothing about those
Keis: 19:24:43: anyone tried Web Developer toolbar (FF add-on)
Oliver Erlewein: 19:25:14: @Keis: Yes, that's also good. Especially for finding out form names for automation of tests.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:25:34: @sdhanasekar has a good list of FF add ons.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:26:48: @Ajay: anywhere we can find a list of those?
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:27:22: <quote author="ajay184f" conversation="#marlena.compton/$1ac63c2f9b84d2b6" timestamp="1273994729" authorname="Ajay Balamurugadas" guid="x4bb90e179bfd3fa5b2ab0791d46d2d959b6379b410fdeecb70f91429a788fd13"><legacyquote>[12:55:29 PM] Ajay Balamurugadas: </legacyquote>@sdhanasekar<legacyquote>

<<< </legacyquote></quote> is the twitter id. Dhanasekar S. He uses a lot of FF add ons.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:28:31: Ok. So I think these were the Q&D test aids. What about real tools that do test automation, defect tracking,.... who's brought some of those?
Oliver Erlewein: 19:29:00: i.e. what do you use at work? OSS or commercial?
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:29:00: Test data creation? anyone?
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:29:17: Well, I work for this company that makes an issue tracker you may have heard of... ;)
Thomas Recker: 19:29:18: Commercial - Quality Center.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:29:24: @Richard: Isn't that called a finger+Excel?
Oliver Erlewein: 19:29:26: ;-)
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:29:38: yeah, im trying to move away from that
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:29:42: my finger is getting sore
Oliver Erlewein: 19:29:52: @Marlena: Any good ;-)
Oliver Erlewein: 19:29:55: ?
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:30:18: Forgive me folks...I have to link, I'll just do the one shameless promotion: http://www.atlassian.com/software/jira/
Oliver Erlewein: 19:30:33: We've started using Jira at our work and I'm very happy with it.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:30:38: Actually, I really like using it.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:31:00: It is commercial but the price is still very acceptable compared to the other contenders.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:31:18: We use Jira via QualIT
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:31:20: I've also been using their wiki software. But you don't have to buy commercial wiki software to get benefit from that for testing.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:31:25: We also have a defect tracking system that was built by my company but that is very basic.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:32:08: I've also used Quality Center and bugzilla.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:32:36: We will be getting a new intranet based on Share Point 2010 which will include Wikis but you won't see me jumping for joy. I'd rather stick to mediawiki.
Thomas Recker: 19:32:43: I've used Redmine (http://www.redmine.org/). Seems to be very lightweight and easy to handle. But we used it only for small projects.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:33:03: Quality Center is the HP one?!
Thomas Recker: 19:33:09: Yep
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:33:14: Yes, it used to be Test Director
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:33:27: The win, though, is if you can link from your wiki to your issues.
Thomas Recker: 19:33:31: It feels very heavy and slow.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:33:35: Yes, I have used that too. And Clear Quest.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:33:40: from rational.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:34:01: I do tend to find the bigger commercial products a bit heavy on the whole admin side.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:34:16: That makes them unusable for small and medium sized projects.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:34:35: bugzilla is a nice free one. Justnot much polish on it.
Thomas Recker: 19:34:36: Ok, thanks for all the new tolls. Unfortunenately I have to leave now
Thomas Recker: 19:34:46: See you around enxt time. Bye.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:34:49: cu Thomas
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:34:52: I also tried using docuwiki with James Bach's lo-tech testing dashboard, and liked it.
vvchamala: 19:34:53: tx thomas...
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:34:57: bye Thomas
Oliver Erlewein: 19:35:15: @Marlena: Haven't tried it yet, might give it a run.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:35:30: Here's a blog post where I friend of mine used that: http://www.testthisblog.com/2007/12/build-day-low-tech-dashboard.html
Oliver Erlewein: 19:35:46: Wikis in general are nice for test documentation but I do get confronted by other testers that don't seem to like it.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:35:55: It was just enough structure without being too much. And if it's in a wiki you can tailor to your situation.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:36:22: @Oliver any reason why they don't like it?
Oliver Erlewein: 19:37:05: Honestly I think it's change that they don't like.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:37:23: Ok. So let's get on with talking about more tools.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:37:49: When i want to find tools I always start here: http://www.opensourcetesting.org
Oliver Erlewein: 19:38:12: There you probably find the single most complete list of open source testing tools.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:38:25: <a href="http://testertools.com/">http://testertools.com/</a>
Oliver Erlewein: 19:38:29: Who has used it before?
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:39:08: http://www.sourceforge.net also has a bunch of stuff
Oliver Erlewein: 19:39:19: @Ajay: Cool, didn't know that one. All free and open source or also commercial?
Oliver Erlewein: 19:39:49: @Richard: sure but not sorted by theme I believe?!
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:40:02: mostly open source
Oliver Erlewein: 19:40:06: ok
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:40:27: <a href="http://www.testersdesk.com">www.testersdesk.com</a>
Oliver Erlewein: 19:41:09: Oohhh Ajay, that looks interesting....
Oliver Erlewein: 19:42:03: Ok, there's Jamses' Pairwise in action....
Oliver Erlewein: 19:42:51: The tools I constantly use for performance testing is JMeter. It is a java based tool and can be used very easily to build huge tests
Oliver Erlewein: 19:43:03: JMeter: http://jakarta.apache.org/jmeter/index.html
Oliver Erlewein: 19:43:26: I've used it for 5 years now and have done dozens of projects with it.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:43:28: That gets a lot of heavy use where I work as well.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:43:54: Like with most Open Source perf test tools it is a little light on the graphing side
Oliver Erlewein: 19:44:06: but nothing excel or scripts can't solve
Oliver Erlewein: 19:44:26: It can totally keep up with all commercial tools out there that cost tons of $$$
Oliver Erlewein: 19:44:58: Grinder is also good but last time I looked it didn't have a GUI interface.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:45:41: For test automation we use Watir in a big style. http://watir.com/
Oliver Erlewein: 19:45:59: Automation IE through a Ruby API
Oliver Erlewein: 19:46:46: What do you use for test automation?
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:47:17: Eh, excel macros at the moment
Oliver Erlewein: 19:47:41: How do you do test automation with Excel?
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:48:18: I load up my valid and invalid data. the sheet handles the test case data sets. then a macro will write each data set to a text file. the file is then pushed into the system.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:48:44: Ah ok. That sounds good.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:48:54: then the report is spat out the system at the end. and the results are read back into the spreadsheet and compared to the expected results. eg. error code matching
Oliver Erlewein: 19:49:16: Such things are commonly the easiest through Excel or Access or similar
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:49:44: yes, but i want to find a tool that will help me create my test case data sets.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:50:04: as they get quite large to maintain
Oliver Erlewein: 19:50:21: @Vishnu: what about you? What's your favourite test tool
Oliver Erlewein: 19:50:23: ?
Keis: 19:50:43: @Richard That sounds interesting... i use excel for preparing my flatfiles (with copy+paste) but mine doesn't go to the point wherein it interacts with the system
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:51:16: im happy to share my macro with you. its quite simple. but the report macro hasnt been developed as yet.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:51:41: There are tools out there that do such stuff on a grand scale but they are usually very expensive.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:51:58: I think there's one called Prince or something
Oliver Erlewein: 19:52:26: don't even know if they are still around. Last time I saw one of those was 2000 or 1999
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:52:27: yeah thats what im finding. im on the search for some nice small simple ones, that can take boundary value inputs, field dependencies, and produce a set of data files
Keis: 19:52:52: @Richard cool! I'd really want to check out that excel macro :)
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:53:21: @Keis, ok
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:53:56: The input is my analysis, and the output is multiple sets of data. it could relate to anything - form data, web form data,
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:55:04: @Richard if you're on the New Zealand software testers list, that might make an excellent post.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:55:13: Good for comparing data is http://winmerge.org/
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:55:25: Oh yeah, diff tools!
Keis: 19:55:31: @Oliver, that's what I use as well :)
Oliver Erlewein: 19:56:00: Well I actually use "diff a.txt b.txt | grep ....." ;-)
Oliver Erlewein: 19:56:21: My biggest testing tool is actually http://www.ubuntu.com/
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:56:22: @Marlena - yes, good point! I will do that
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 19:56:27: thanks
Oliver Erlewein: 19:56:54: Unix offers a heap of stuff that allows you to process and verify data.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:57:19: @Oliver yes! and I use a lot of that stuff on the mac as well.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:58:03: Also worth mentioning is http://www.virtualbox.org
Oliver Erlewein: 19:58:21: for virtualisation of test environments especially for browser testing
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 19:59:14: win merge looks like a does a great visual diff.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 19:59:48: Its simple and quick.
Oliver Erlewein: 19:59:50: Yes indeed.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:00:00: Seems like I've used that before. Stuff like this comes in handy when I"m checking that devs did actually change stuff.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:00:32: If you just need some unix capabilities on Windows try using cygwin (http://www.cygwin.com/). That's heaps of fun too.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:00:46: ok.
Keis: 20:01:06: @oliver, i downloaded that when i was trying to learn unix commands :D
Oliver Erlewein: 20:01:07: What about selenium? Anyone using it here?
Oliver Erlewein: 20:01:26: seleniumhq.org
Oliver Erlewein: 20:01:43: I am keen to but can't find the time
Keis: 20:01:45: Re: Selenium, that's something i actually want to try out. I've downloaded the selenium IDE for firefox before
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:01:54: @keis have you played with dos commands? those are fun too.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:02:12: @Keis: ignore that FF thing that's just a record and playback
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:02:28: Actually that helps to learn syntax
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:02:35: <quote author="olivernz" conversation="#marlena.compton/$1ac63c2f9b84d2b6" timestamp="1273996928" authorname="Oliver Erlewein" guid="x491bdbde074eea0a627b28fbcbcf448032128e21cf09f0987c6d35cb2d5c7b70"><legacyquote>[1:32:08 PM] Oliver Erlewein: </legacyquote> ignore that FF thing<legacyquote>

<<< </legacyquote></quote>?
Keis: 20:02:38: @oliver, yeah... is Selenium RC better?
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:02:56: I had success with using the record and play feature, then getting code to use with TestNG
Oliver Erlewein: 20:03:00: Selenium RC is the real thing.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:03:19: @Marlena: TestNG?
Keis: 20:03:36: @Marlena, i know only a few DOS commands... anything particularly nifty that u've used?
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:03:42: Yes...it's for doing unit tests, but you can use it with selenium
Oliver Erlewein: 20:03:55: Ok, good tip
Oliver Erlewein: 20:04:26: @Keis: dos is too weak for anything constructive. Have a look at Unix & cygwin. That'll get you farther.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:04:29: @keis I did some poking around in the help and found an awesome guide to dos commands in windows.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:04:51: Oliver has a good point though.
Keis: 20:05:04: @marlena still, maybe those could be helpful for making a .bat file ?
Keis: 20:05:07: :D
Oliver Erlewein: 20:05:17: The new windows shell is supposed to be good but I haven't tried it. Too happy with bash & co.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:05:29: <quote author="marlena.compton" conversation="#marlena.compton/$1ac63c2f9b84d2b6" timestamp="1273997064" authorname="Marlena Compton" guid="xcb40c4050ff6ea43873fc3de2903af346da3460ecb81692067d1c7a44bbf9362"><legacyquote>[1:34:24 PM] Marlena Compton: </legacyquote> in the help and found an awesome guide to dos commands<legacyquote>

<<< </legacyquote></quote>Help of which app Marlena?
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:05:35: Oh yeah...and it's good to know that stuff. Sometimes it can be very helpful even it it doesn't have the same power as unix
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:05:50: It's the OS help
Oliver Erlewein: 20:05:51: What I'm grateful for is knowing some Ruby and Python so I can script my way out of a data-hole.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:06:01: oh ok.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:06:12: @Richard: That would probably also be the next step for you after Excel.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:06:20: If you go to Windows help through the start (?) menu, and type dos, you might get it.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:06:43: Thanks.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:07:03: Anybody ever come accross any Tets Management tools? Non commercial I mean?
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:07:16: Docuwiki...ftw!
Oliver Erlewein: 20:08:01: The french seem to have something called Salome
Oliver Erlewein: 20:08:20: Tried it and it's not half bad but doesn't quite fit what I want.
vvchamala: 20:08:25: @Marlena: just type help at command shell
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:08:43: @Oliver: whats the next step? Ruby on Python?
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:08:49: *and
Oliver Erlewein: 20:09:29: @Richard: I meant translating your excel stuff into either Ruby or Python if that gives you any advantage
Oliver Erlewein: 20:10:25: I've just started on a Scrum/Agile project as a tester. Any cool tools to support SBT or other agile testing methods?
Keis: 20:10:38: Re: wiki, i use a personal wiki (from tiddlywiki.com) for notes... it's a single file so it's easy to transfer / maintain
Oliver Erlewein: 20:10:47: Over and above what James B has?
Keis: 20:11:10: i haven't tried out Docuwiki though...
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:11:13: SOAPUI seems pretty good. You can harness in files if your infrastructure allows it.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:11:26: You can test each component in the early stages of agile, when they are not all connected
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:11:48: @keis I think a lot of the wikis have fairly similar basic functionality. Someone installed docuwiki at work so that's why I used it.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:12:05: @Keis: That's what I was looking for! Thanks!!!
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:12:20: @keis and that's what I paired with JB's lo-tech testing dashboard to get away from Quality Center.
Keis: 20:13:12: @Oliver, there's also wiki-on-a-stick ... http://stickwiki.sourceforge.net/
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:13:36: @Oliver my employer has an agile plugin but I said I'd only do one shameless self-promotion. Oops... http://www.atlassian.com/software/greenhopper/
Oliver Erlewein: 20:14:25: @Marlena: You're allowed to do promotion in this event.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:14:38: Thanks cuz I really can't help myself ;)
Oliver Erlewein: 20:14:50: @Marlena: Nice but won't help me as this is on site for customer.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:14:59: I can give him a link though ;-)
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:15:13: I'm interested in this stickwiki thing.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:15:34: @Marlena: Serves me right for not reading.....thanks!
Oliver Erlewein: 20:17:41: We're nearly at the end of our time. Any more tools or requests?
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:18:06: Hmmm, just adding one tool. <a href="http://ccollomb.free.fr/unlocker/">http://ccollomb.free.fr/unlocker/</a>
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:18:38: Freemind <a href="http://freemind.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page">http://freemind.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page</a>
Oliver Erlewein: 20:18:43: Looks interesting and useful!
Oliver Erlewein: 20:19:00: Yess, forgot about freemind
Oliver Erlewein: 20:19:09: Oh and....
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:19:15: Very often, while testing, we are unable to delete and Unlocker helps.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:19:26: A camera or camera phone and a USB stick
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:19:29: I did try the trial versions of Inspiration, Novamind
Oliver Erlewein: 20:19:36: There are errors you cannot screenshot!
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:19:41: They are nice too.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:19:55: @oliver you mean you take pictures!
Oliver Erlewein: 20:20:00: MindMapper is also good but $$$$
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:20:02: <quote author="olivernz" conversation="#marlena.compton/$1ac63c2f9b84d2b6" timestamp="1273997971" authorname="Oliver Erlewein" guid="x2f0a878d819ad5bb1e60d1dda798b78d6be0af4ff0661e6aa150354606007021"><legacyquote>[1:49:31 PM] Oliver Erlewein: </legacyquote>There are errors you cannot screenshot!<legacyquote>

<<< </legacyquote></quote>Agree, how do you deal that?
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:20:19: the one we covered in WT35 was interesting: http://www.prezi.com - you can create mind maps and turn them into presentations and share online. very cool
Oliver Erlewein: 20:20:20: @Marlena: Yess pictures of bluescreens and the such
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:20:26: mobile camera ?
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:20:54: I love prezi. Used it to make a prezo of WT.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:21:15: Have to take a look at that.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:21:15: yes it has a Mac feel to it
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:21:15: WT35 inspiration was Marlena's prezo
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:21:17: <ss type="smile">:)</ss>
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:21:29: ahhhhh :) well done Marlena
Keis: 20:21:39: cool :)
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:21:42: oh...I'm so busted! I haven't read that. I'll go take a look at it for sure now ;)
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:22:02: jeez...my face is 5 shades of red right now.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:22:07: It will be up on Wednesday
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:22:17: I cant wait :)
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:22:18: :p
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:22:24: TWITTER - How good a tool it is?
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:22:28: I bet you guys had fun with Prezi. I noticed it had a few bugs.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:22:57: Yep, it was a fun, but unstable-at-times web app. overall im in love with it.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:23:00: TWITTER has given me nearly too much input from other people.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:23:02: ;-)
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:23:37: few quick questions, info would be highly appreciated.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:23:41: I think there must be a story in the fact that Prezi has some problems, but it's still so lovable.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:23:44: But I think I finally got the hang of twittering
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:24:09: 1. How do you keep your Tool repository - up to date? Go in search of tools or is it need based.
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:24:14: Twitter can be overwhelming. I got to a point where I realized I just can't follow everyone in testing.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:24:31: @jay: depends on the tool.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:24:47: 2. I want to learn few tools to assist and then get interested in some other tools. how do you manage to focus?
Oliver Erlewein: 20:24:53: Watir we're stuck on a version because upgrading breaks some of our tests :(
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:25:28: Autoit - <a href="http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/index.shtml">http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/index.shtml</a>
Oliver Erlewein: 20:25:54: Yes, Autoit is also being used for some stuff by Watir
Oliver Erlewein: 20:26:20: But as an automated testing tool a bit cumbersome
Keis: 20:26:46: @Ajay... i think for me it depends more on what i need to do. Occasionally, i come across tools mentioned / shared by others (thru blogs, twitter, friends), and if it seems like something i could use later on, i note it down to check it out later.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:27:14: Thanks, I too have a folder: S/w to explore...
Oliver Erlewein: 20:27:41: Yeah, I think the best thing to have is a rough knowledge of what tools do so that when you get into the thick of it you know where to turn.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:27:56: and that was my reasoning behind this session.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:28:14: wireshark
Oliver Erlewein: 20:28:30: Needed for performance testing analysis
Oliver Erlewein: 20:28:39: as is the Windows tool perfmon
Oliver Erlewein: 20:29:03: or top, iftop, iotop, ps,.... under unix
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:29:14: Perlclip <ss type="wink">;)</ss> AllPairs
Oliver Erlewein: 20:29:20: lol
Oliver Erlewein: 20:29:26: was waiting for that
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:30:01: on twitter you might like to follow @cgoldberg who is into performance testing. He writes performance testing tools for fun: http://code.google.com/p/multi-mechanize/
Oliver Erlewein: 20:30:17: Ok. I want to start wrapping up. Can we have a quick round the table on if this was a useful session for you and aybe what you'd like to see in some of the future sessions?
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:30:54: EXCELLENT session. I liked every minute and all the 68 links posted
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:31:46: ok not 68
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:31:50: 40
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:31:52: <ss type="smile">:)</ss>
Keis: 20:31:55: Enjoyed it as well... a lot of take-aways for me in this session :)
Oliver Erlewein: 20:32:23: Any wishes for future sessions?
Marlena Compton (WTANZ,AUS): 20:32:26: It's like Tester Christmas in May. Santa has come early.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:32:43: lol
Oliver Erlewein: 20:33:01: Yes, I learnt quite a bit too. Sort of turned out like I hoped.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:33:04: :-D
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:33:12: Ha ha... Pick up a tool and an expert guides the exploration o fthe tool
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:33:46: Thanks everyone for sharing. I think it is important to hear the popular tools that people are using. And not all were testing tools either.
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:34:10: My work bag is going to be so full of these tool tomorrow
Richard Robinson (WTANZ): 20:34:15: s
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:34:36: Thanks Oliver, Marlena, Richard
Oliver Erlewein: 20:34:41: I will start using the portable Wikis above. How cool.
Ajay Balamurugadas (WT,India Facilitator): 20:34:48: It was a great session. Lots of take away for me.
Oliver Erlewein: 20:34:50: Thank you all.
vvchamala: 20:35:03: me too guys, tx fr sharing info on tools..
Oliver Erlewein: 20:35:05: I'll herewith end the "official" session and cut the log. ;-)