GeekNights Monday - The Premature Death of QA

MrPeriod

Yahoo has declared QA dead. Tonight on GeekNights, we have some thoughts. Unit tests and test driven development are valid ideas, but they are often misused. In the news, basically all drones in the US must now be registered, American NIMBYs think solar panels steal sunlight from crops and scare young people away, MIT unleashes Vuvuzela for deniable communication, Google bans Symantec root certificates due to their egregious betrayal of trust (possibly related to US government snooping), Gigster has a horrible business model, and Philips adds DRM lockouts to its lightbulb firmware (proving that we are nigh on cyberpunk dystopia),

• Afterglow
• Making of Afterglow
• Can't sign into Google Calendar on my fridge

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AaronC

I'm glad to see drones will be registered and that drone operators will need to take some basic classes about airspace. We are seeing more and more near misses with drones and drones interfering with EMS crews, fire fighting and commercial airliners. It's only a matter of time until we have a collision and I am hoping that the education part of the registration process will limit the accidents. There is no way to force every drone operator to take classes or register (there are people flying airplanes without certification in the US who usually get caught when they have an accident, but it's a very small number), but making it part of the drone culture will have a big impact.

I don't mind sharing my airspace with drones, but they need to know how dangerous it can be for even a small drone to collide with an aircraft, especially a smaller aircraft such as a helicopter.

Rym

The ease of access created the danger. Previously, while much more substantial gas powered RC planes were flying with regularity, even with out-of-sight remote control, this was the realm of people with a lot of time and/or money to kill, and the community was very good at enforcing basic rules of use.

Anyone can drop some money and come home with a pretty sizeable drone and start flying it that day without any experience or even basic knowledge.

AaronC

Agreed. I used to regularly fly over an RC airfield in Long Island. As a good pilot I knew it was there (it was on the charts) and so took care to fly at least 500 feet above it (a typical light helicopter altitude). I also didn't loiter in the area. I take the same precautions on places where parachute operations happen or para sailing. The guys on the ground were careful to stay near the field and to not go about 500 feet.

500 feet isn't very high for a good drone and it's the basic lower altitude that helicopters will be operating at. Of course we also operate lower when needed for the job or landing and taking off. Since we might be landing in unconventional places (such as an accident scene or near a fire) we are being exposed to drones that people are sending up.

When the cost of entry is high, such as RC planes and helicopters that can fly that high) the level of responsibility also has been high. Drones.... ugh.

Rym

That's what scares me the most. Helicopters are coming and going along Manhattan's shores all day every day. And I see drones whizzing along above the water regularly when I'm bike commuting..

Churba

Airfield near me, YBAF, has already had a few close calls in the past, but thankfully no serious incidents. We've got laws in place already, and most people follow them, but there's always that one dickhead.

Our laws are as follows:

- No closer than 30 meters to any building or vehicle you don't own.

- Not within 30 meters of a person, and not above any large gatherings of people.

- Never within 5.5km radius of any airfield, airport, or other designated site for operating aircraft(hospitals with landing pads, for example) without explicit permission.

- Daylight flying only, only under clear conditions, and must be within your line-of-sight

- Never above 400 feet without explicit permission

- No FPV allowed without explicit permission

- Not for commercial purposes without a CASA approved certification.

Explicit permission is tricky to get for any of those, and without a certification, almost impossible to get. However, some exemptions apply - for example, indoor racing can be FPV and within 30m of people without permission or certification, assuming you have permission from the property owner.

You do not want to break those rules because CASA does not fuck around. $8500 per offense. If you actually put someone at risk while doing so, the penalties get a lot more serious, and can absolutely include jail time.

Linkigi(Link-ee-jee)

Oh look, Yahoo discovered automated testing. Good for them.

Coldguy

As a QA person for my company you be surprised on how eager the higher ups are in getting rid of us and just freeballing their software. Thankfully common sense is prevailing and we are catching major code flaws and have tangible evidence over the year to show that we caught a bunch of stuff that would have gone unnoticed.

Despite all that I am still looking for a new place to go.

Not because the company isn't doing well (might have a HUGE client come in later this month) it more so on their take on agile testing. Automation? That's for 2017 at the earliest, we need to just focus on manual testing now and get the program working....once we figure out what that means from the haphazard specifications. What's this static testing and checking the requirements before going to sprint? You want us to number the requirements so that they can be cross referenced? No such poppycock shall happen.

See why I was nervous in asking for resume tips early last month?

Also once I get some things squared away with some side projects for upcoming panels I am jumping so hard into Selenium so I can add that to my bag of tricks. Automation is the obvious path to go and I rather join the train before it leaves the station. Also the concept of future proofing my job is always nice. See below.



Also as for the stinger, I got two of the three with the PSX classics, that third one I did not catch as well.

Daikun

MrPeriod said:

Yahoo has declared QA dead.

Yahoo’s tech staff—all of whom were focused on software developments

They develop software? I thought they just buy over people's software, then close or sell it after a few years.

Ruffas

Yahoo Japan still makes a lot of stuff.

Matt

I bought a Samsung fridge a few months ago. Me, my wife, and the Best Buy employee all had a great laugh over the prospect of buying a fridge with a smart screen on it. He tried to say something about it controlling music playback and I gave him a look, and he couldn't keep a straight face.

Cremlian

At the same time I have thought about putting a computer in every room of my house... Though Ironically for a smart fridge, the only room I don't have a physical connection is the Kitchen...

Matt

My wife sent me a neat Instructable about how to use a Raspberry Pi to display some widgets as an overlay on a full-length mirror. She was enamored with the idea of having a calendar/weather/mail display sitting there while she got ready in the morning. It's the sort of thing I could see being ultimately useless and a bear to maintain, but I might wind up doing one day solely for the fact that I'll learn a lot in the process.

Dazzle369

Reasons to use yahoo: to sign up junk accounts, flickr

SWATrous

One thing is with the RC stuff, apparently with this move the FAA somewhat usurped charge of all RC type craft which used to be under a different association's control. Which is upsetting plenty of people in that community.

As-is, I don't know how many fatalities drones have actually caused, I havn't been able to find anything after a cursory look. I know there are fatalities recorded from traditional hobby RC craft. I know for sure of one from an RC plane which happened to strike its operator, while my grandfather was there to witness (amongst others.) (http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/clubhouse/138709-rc-fatality-print.html) Yet because these things happen in their own little communities away from public spaces more-or-less, it isn't a major issue.

So that said I do get that drones are warranting some regulation, rules of operation and means of enforcing such. I'd say a drone-operator license for anything over a minimum power/weight is the obvious choice, requiring a basic class, test, and fee. The per-drone registration is at the first glance a not-bad choice but I don't think it's going to do all that much on its own. I see needing at least a basic operator's card to run the registered drones being in the future.

Churba

No fatalities so far, but the FAA has recorded hundreds of close calls. As of late August, there was about 700 incidents recorded on the FAA's books.

AaronC

I have no problem with a drone certificate (FAA doesn't issue licenses, the more you know) is great. It requires a minimum knowledge to be passed and ensure that there are no excuses when someone violates airspace or creates a hazard to other aircraft.

Churba

AaronC said:

I have no problem with a drone certificate (FAA doesn't issue licenses, the more you know) is great. It requires a minimum knowledge to be passed and ensure that there are no excuses when someone violates airspace or creates a hazard to other aircraft.

Down here, we do have a cert, but it's only for commercial operators. Well, not to say a regular person can't get one, but rather, that it's only required for commercial operators. Pretty basic, but they do check you have all the required knowledge and basic skills.

Linkigi(Link-ee-jee)

So I've got a lot to say on the show topic, given that my job is developing automated testing tools.

Automated tests are pretty much always better than human QA, but there are areas where writing reliable automated tests are really hard and human QA is absolutely necessary, and so I agree with you guys that ditching human QA is a Bad Idea.
However, I disagree strongly with Scott on unit testing - developers should absolutely write their own unit tests. Writing unit tests makes you do a second-look verification that your code is doing the right thing, and in my experience I generally catch a couple bugs during unit tests. Moreover, the best part of automated testing is that it shortens the develop-debug-develop cycle, because you don't have to wait on other humans to test your code and find bugs, since the automated tests find them. Waiting for someone to come in, figure out how your code works, and then write tests that catch obvious flaws that you should have caught with unit testing defeats that whole purpose.

Also, writing tests for other people's code sucks.

Apreche

Someone drank the Kool-Aid.

Rym

Oh, I think developers should write their own unit tests, especially if they're part of a build process.

But I also recognize that developers fucking hate writing unit tests.

pence

It's like writing documentation.

GUESS WHAT I DID THIS WEEK.

Rym

I don't know which I dislike more: writing documentation, or writing contracts.

Andrew

Grant proposals are the worst.

Matt

I'll be over here with my 80-page requirements documents and UML models.

Linkigi(Link-ee-jee)

Apreche said:

Someone drank the Kool-Aid.

Their Kool-Aid is delicious.

pence

TDD

Tang's Delicious, Dude

(Tang is not delicious)

AaronC

Churba said:

AaronC said:

I have no problem with a drone certificate (FAA doesn't issue licenses, the more you know) is great. It requires a minimum knowledge to be passed and ensure that there are no excuses when someone violates airspace or creates a hazard to other aircraft.

Down here, we do have a cert, but it's only for commercial operators. Well, not to say a regular person can't get one, but rather, that it's only required for commercial operators. Pretty basic, but they do check you have all the required knowledge and basic skills.

The FAA currently has levels of pilot certificates. You can get a Sports pilot or Recreational certificate, a private pilot, a commercial pilot and later an instructor or Airline Transport Pilot. The differences usually have to do with level of knowledge and shown proficiency with maneuvers, but the lowest levels were designed so that you could fly yourself and a friend around in smaller airplanes with less regulation and less medical oversight, but not less ability or knowledge.

I don't care if a recreational drone pilot understands the fundamentals of lift and can accurately describe it to a FAA examiner, but I do want them to be able to read an aviation chart and understand how other aircraft operate in the airspace environment and how they can pose a real and significant danger to other operations.

Coldguy

pence said:

TDD

Tang's Delicious, Dude

(Tang is not delicious)

Donate your Tang to the head of arcades, he carries no less then 128 Oz. of Tang on him at all times.

Churba

AaronC said:

I don't care if a recreational drone pilot understands the fundamentals of lift and can accurately describe it to a FAA examiner, but I do want them to be able to read an aviation chart and understand how other aircraft operate in the airspace environment and how they can pose a real and significant danger to other operations.

That pretty much falls under "required knowledge and basic skills", to my eye. We have pretty comprehensive rules right now, but frankly, I'd like to see more - an equivalent to a Sport Pilot cert for drones. Something that ensures people know what's up when it comes to flying.

Really, the biggest problem with the whole thing, is that it's not easy to obtain or fly a traditional aircraft without anyone noticing. Drones? I could buy one today, start buzzing it around above my house - strictly illegal, being within a 5.5km/3nm radius of an airport - at 600-700 feet, and nobody would even notice to report me.

Rym

Philips appears to have backed down on their lightbulb DRM.

http://developers.slashdot.org/story/15/12/16/1856241/philips-wont-block-third-party-bulbs-after-all