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I'm a QA at a startup and I don't think it sucks. I really enjoy my job and I think it requires variety of skills. In order for you to really excel at QA, you n

I'm a QA at a startup and I don't think it sucks. I really enjoy my job and I think it requires variety of skills. In order for you to really excel at QA, you need to know a thing or two about programming, databases, client-side scripting( JavaScript in my case), usability, TDD and etc. This whole combination makes it really interesting. Can you share your experience or opinion on why you think it stinks?

div 17y ago
Can't speak for the parent, but from my experience, most developers think QA stinks because they have had to do it on the side. If you have to do it on the side, you usually don't have time to do it properly and write tests / scripts or do coding stuff in general, you are simply reduced to doing rote testing. Rote testing stinks.
- hopeless 17y ago
  My experience, as a developer in huge multinational that has been involuntary moved into QA: it sucks. You might need sysadmin skills but not dev skills. You don't get to solve the problems, just identify them. If you do overstep the boundaries by suggesting a solution, you'll quickly be put back in your place. And lastly, although the automation carrot is often dangled the deadlines are always tighter than the human resources for manual testing so you'll just have to test it over and over and over again.
alexgartrell 17y ago
Well first off, i'm sorry for that off the cuff comment. I didn't mean to downplay the importance of QA (the world would suck without it, for sure) nor the importance of QA positions. It just isn't development, which was what I was looking to do. I agree very much with Joel Spolsky's thoughts on the subject. http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000067.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000067.html As to my story, I was placed into QA in the "choice" program because they misrepresented the role (it was an internship). The skills required listed C programmer, but on the first day, I was told there would be no programming. The first few weeks I configured test beds. This was a lot of installation of server stuff (mostly following check lists) and configuration of networks. This was very IT'ish, and though important (and it sparked my interest in how exactly networks work, which I followed up on my own time), it wasn't what I was hoping for. I got into automated testing shortly thereafter because they needed someone to do it and I had a lot of programming experience. I coded in Java using an IBM testing thing and a company framework provided by another QA person. This framework was buggy and _completely_ undocumented. In one place, there were 14 nested If/For's. There were obvious design flaws. Not only that, the person who wrote it was wholly unavailable (constantly busy). She did find time to do reviews when I only had an hour left in the internship to respond to them. Ironically, one complaint was that I recreated her functionality in some parts (if only I'd KNOWN about it!) So, in short, my experience dictates that QA in large organizations means people that don't give a crap and do the bare minimum. I don't know if this is a QA problem or a large corporation problem, but no thanks to either.

div 17y ago

Can't speak for the parent, but from my experience, most developers think QA stinks because they have had to do it on the side. If you have to do it on the side, you usually don't have time to do it properly and write tests / scripts or do coding stuff in general, you are simply reduced to doing rote testing. Rote testing stinks.

hopeless 17y ago
My experience, as a developer in huge multinational that has been involuntary moved into QA: it sucks. You might need sysadmin skills but not dev skills. You don't get to solve the problems, just identify them. If you do overstep the boundaries by suggesting a solution, you'll quickly be put back in your place. And lastly, although the automation carrot is often dangled the deadlines are always tighter than the human resources for manual testing so you'll just have to test it over and over and over again.

alexgartrell 17y ago

Well first off, i'm sorry for that off the cuff comment. I didn't mean to downplay the importance of QA (the world would suck without it, for sure) nor the importance of QA positions. It just isn't development, which was what I was looking to do. I agree very much with Joel Spolsky's thoughts on the subject. http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000067.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000067.html As to my story, I was placed into QA in the "choice" program because they misrepresented the role (it was an internship). The skills required listed C programmer, but on the first day, I was told there would be no programming. The first few weeks I configured test beds. This was a lot of installation of server stuff (mostly following check lists) and configuration of networks. This was very IT'ish, and though important (and it sparked my interest in how exactly networks work, which I followed up on my own time), it wasn't what I was hoping for. I got into automated testing shortly thereafter because they needed someone to do it and I had a lot of programming experience. I coded in Java using an IBM testing thing and a company framework provided by another QA person. This framework was buggy and _completely_ undocumented. In one place, there were 14 nested If/For's. There were obvious design flaws. Not only that, the person who wrote it was wholly unavailable (constantly busy). She did find time to do reviews when I only had an hour left in the internship to respond to them. Ironically, one complaint was that I recreated her functionality in some parts (if only I'd KNOWN about it!) So, in short, my experience dictates that QA in large organizations means people that don't give a crap and do the bare minimum. I don't know if this is a QA problem or a large corporation problem, but no thanks to either.