I agreed 100% with beginning but I got lost with the automatic verification engineers. Especially with the part starting with “ You also need to level up your skills in the testing and deployment lifecycle….” How do you know what skills the qa person possesses? This sounds exactly like the things I might hear from developer explaining how I should do my work and what tools I should use.
Test automation is not same coding that developers do. I don’t mean from quality point but they have completely different set of things that matter.
Unlike writer here may think while it is important to have tests that pass or fail fast the performance is not one of the most important characteristics. You see tests are run less often than the code and not all tests need to run every time or even every day.
One of the most important characteristics of a good test is something developers easily overlook. It is maintainability. When code is written then it’s tested and then it sits in codebase until refactored. Tests don’t get this. Tests work on environment that is under constant change (especially in shift left) that makes maintainability and abstraction layers much more important with test automation code than with developing a feature.
Something to note that some developers do not understand testing at all. They may think it’s all about getting tests passed or getting software broken. It’s not either of those. It’s just checking that software works like expected in different scenarios.
Because of those two things: code maintainability and (mis)understanding testing in deeper level, some developers do great tests and enjoy good qa as resulting product gets better. And then there are developers that struggle with all of that and usually with their developing as well.
I didn’t understand quite the point of the claims from end of the page. Surely automatic cars or health/banking services don’t use language models for anything important. Everyone knows those hallucinate. ML is lot better alternative.
This was the FizzBuzz python code from chatGPT that prints out differently if value is even and dividable by 3 and 5. Simple task and very nice implementation.
def fizzbuzz_even_surprise(n):
return [
(lambda x: 'Surprise' if x % 2 == 0 and x % 3 == 0 and x % 5 == 0 else 'Fizz'(x % 3 == 0) + 'Buzz'(x % 5 == 0) or x)(x)
for x in range(1, n+1)
]
I am 10 years younger than you and had my share of burnouts. I think you have a good tip there: stop doing stuff you don’t enjoy. But I would add another suggestion: do stuff you do enjoy.
It’s really important. Burnout leads to life without joy. Joy prevents burnouts as it helps to keep balance between work life and life outside work.
Also strangely enough, for me starting freelancing has helped a lot. I have a feeling that if I get “ stop, I don’t like this!” thoughts, I can just leave the project. I have never done it yet but that is a possibility and I have saved some money so that it is a true alternative. Also now that I am not employed at some startup/big company anymore, I don’t need to think career or continue at work place I don’t enjoy because of stocks/options. Moneywise not a best solution but it has made my life better and I don’t have burnouts anymore.
Most important thing for me is my business, and most important thing for my business is my happiness and well-being because without me my business doesn’t survive.
Hi. Had similar thing happening to me about 15 years ago. I was bit younger than you and had a kid.
I jumped to consulting and did that for a 10 years then worked couple of years in a startup as a manager. Then I started my own business. Looking back now, I could have started my business a lot earlier. No regrets though.
If you have savings, travel. Especially in Europe you might be able to take that 1/2 years off just for yourself and your passions.
Coming back to your comment about starting a business. If you're open to sharing, how did your business come about, and why do you say you could have done it earlier?
I'm asking because my long-term goal is to run my own business, and I'm wondering if I'm ready to do so now or if it would indeed pay off to wait and gather more experience and know-how, or if you'd recommend just going right fo rit.
Thank you for your perspective. I was also considering consulting. Re Europe, incidentally I am going there in August for a family wedding, and I plan to stretch the trip out for at least a month.
Test automation is not same coding that developers do. I don’t mean from quality point but they have completely different set of things that matter. Unlike writer here may think while it is important to have tests that pass or fail fast the performance is not one of the most important characteristics. You see tests are run less often than the code and not all tests need to run every time or even every day. One of the most important characteristics of a good test is something developers easily overlook. It is maintainability. When code is written then it’s tested and then it sits in codebase until refactored. Tests don’t get this. Tests work on environment that is under constant change (especially in shift left) that makes maintainability and abstraction layers much more important with test automation code than with developing a feature.
Something to note that some developers do not understand testing at all. They may think it’s all about getting tests passed or getting software broken. It’s not either of those. It’s just checking that software works like expected in different scenarios.
Because of those two things: code maintainability and (mis)understanding testing in deeper level, some developers do great tests and enjoy good qa as resulting product gets better. And then there are developers that struggle with all of that and usually with their developing as well.