Writing a Book in 30 Evenings

As mentioned I have written a book. Looking through my notes I have around 30 versions, one for each significant session of working on it. I have been asked to share tips on writing a book, so here you go, Simon. The key lessons are:

1. Set a Recurring Time and Space
2. Unique Content – Reference the Rest
3. Storyline and Flow
4. The opposite of passive voice is not an aggressive voice
5. LeanPub’bing

Set a Recurring Time and Space

One of my book’s themes was moving something from a hunch to a hard truth. And the same really applies here. When I finished my master’s degree while working (back in 2002), I had two slots a week at a “study office”. From that, I learned that not all study days are equally productive “on paper” – but that’s ok. Each session had its purpose.

Similarly for my book project. I set a weekly evening booking in my Calendar – family chores were arranged around it. After dinner, I work start working on the book and work for 2-2½ hours. I used my personal computer in my work-from-home setup.

Unique Content – Reference the Rest

There is so much great content out there already, my focus was on writing about my experience and my vision of better test strategies. But to do that I needed to stand on the shoulders of others to set the scene and describe the techniques I applied.

While writing I did want to bring in loads of existing content to elaborate and provide a foundation for my thinking. While editing I removed most of it, partly because I didn’t want to sound like a high school book report (thank you for that one Tristan). What I did leave in were quotes, recommendations, and listings of the work of others. The book is full of footnotes directly on the page (as compared to end notes) to highlight everyone in context.

Storyline and Flow

Initially, I outlined the chapters and subchapters and it was important to get the right “flow” and storyline into the content. My base model was inspired by “Situation, Complication, Question, Answer” from the guide “How to present to executives” (StaffEng Book) and similar lessons on taking the first steps.

• This is the situation and challenges
• These are the techniques, we can build on
• These are the first steps, where the techniques are used

One thing I have worked a lot on is the flow of the text: Sections would be 4-6 lines long, with empty lines in between. I also worked to reduce “dangling lines”, so no two lines would linger into the next page. No pages should be text only, so quotes and illustrations are important for readability – as well as making the book content visible. Lastly, I worked a lot on having one section end with words that tap into the next section.

The below recommendation is cool, I could have done that too.

15 years ago my PhD advisor taught me One Weird Trick for editing your own writing. Edit **back to front**, paragraph by paragraph. I still use it and it still surprises me how well it works. When I get my students to do it, it often blows their minds. Try it!

— Arvind Narayanan (@random_walker) October 16, 2022

The opposite of passive voice is not an aggressive voice

Often I started my “book evening” by reading the book from the start all over again. As I’m not a native English writer, I installed Grammarly and paid for the premium version for a period to rewrite phrases that were in a passive form. Fun Fact: the opposite of passive voice, is not an aggressive voice but an active voice.

Have proofread quite a few books for my friends in space. Couple of Stage Mom top tips:
– Avoid colloquial language for global readers
– Know your audience. If for beginners, use footnotes or end notes
– Don’t overuse passive voice
– Tell stories from your experience! pic.twitter.com/sehtnM5bRx

— Tristan Lombard 🇺🇦 (@TristanLombard2) October 2, 2022

The tool you use to write your book isn’t that important. I used Google Docs with embedded Google Drawings, others might prefer Word or other editing platforms. The biggest challenge in publishing was getting the embedded pictures in a resolution that could be printed by the print shop. The book exists in a printed format – but it’s primarily an electronic book.

LeanPub’bing

Self-publishing on LeanPub is intuitive and easy, it also has tools for incremental versions, previews, and updates. Let people sign up for it in advance with price suggestions. That allows you to set a price on the book based on audience-based quotes.

They also have a great system for coupons. I have coupons for those that helped in preparing the book, those I have referenced, and those that participated in the virtual launch. Let me know with the phrase “LeanPubbing” if you want a coupon too.

Taking My Own Medicine

Recently I had the chance to apply my own templates to myself and my active project – as I had to mentor a new test manager. I was challenged in explaining how I read the upcoming IT environment project. After looking into resources for new test leads, I realized I could take my own medicine.

Photo by PhotoMIX Company on Pexels.com

A year ago, I created a new test plan format – the Situational Aware Test Plan. While mind-maps and one-page test plan canvases exist, I wanted to elaborate using the evolution principles from Wardley mapping and stop writing test plan documents.

The table structure is there to provide guard rails for the elaboration. I will use the Darlings, Pets, Cattle, and GUID -mnemonic as headlines. Our strategic decisions emerge as we use the worksheet based on the current situation and state. The strategies will be the decisions to push a field in the grid to another state. 

Delivery and Situation

	Darlings	Pets	Cattle	GUID’s
New project	Fixed date
Existing delivery speed		Scheduled Quarterly
Test Environments, internal			Repeatable
Test environments with integrations	Crafted	Some existing know-how
Environment Infrastructure			Hosted data center practices
Test data		Known but cumbersome

While this project introduces new test environments, there is an existing environment with a quarterly delivery pace. This is a classic example of the core chronic conflict of pursuing both: responding to the rapidly changing competitive landscape and providing stable, reliable, and secure services (DevOps handbook introduction xxv) as elaborated on Align your Test Strategy to your Business Strategy.

The test team allocated beside me and the new test lead is a new junior and senior tester. We are in the same team, and most are even in the same office. So collaboration will be collaborative and pervasive, with a focus on helping the new people grow.

The test team

	Darlings	Pets	Cattle	GUID’s
Test team collaboration			Growing	Pervasive
Test lead			Growing
Mentoring		Enabling
Domain know-how		Getting there

Test tools and approach

	Darlings	Pets	Cattle	GUID’s
Test activity	Explore integrations		Confirm internal requirements
Test cases			Existing can be updated.
Test case repro			Create new repository

As mentioned in the blog post about visualization, we can now use the map to discuss why we need CT and ET for the project. Based on the project’s layout, I would advise having an expert exploration of the integrations and more standard scripts for the known construction of the internal environments.

What About Expected Results?

TL;DR: We should know better than to require expected results in test case steps.

Welcome to 2022 – where old wisdom surfaces yet again. Recently I considered expected results in test cases. It seems the topic is still relevant – I wrote about it in “The Expected” back in 2015.

As always we have to backup a bit and consider: What purpose does the detailed steps have to our stakeholders. How visible is the value provided? We have to start from their viewpoint – not build a chain of reasoning up from our own wishful thinking.

Currently I’m working on a project for payments of benefits. We have daily CI/CD and loads of classic manual testing. The key message from the stakeholders is that they expect things to be tested and evaluated. They generally trust us and collaborate with us on the work, so there is not so much discussion on the details as in other projects. Yet the discussion of expected results did come up in our internal dialog: What is the reasoning behind expected results on the test case steps – besides coming from an old book.

Testing is a performance

One of the usual arguments is that it enables hard-over from person to another. While handover can be relevant to consider if the team members changes often. It seems to me just to create redundant information based on requirements and other oracles. I mean where does it it end, why should we add every project information into the test cases and into the test plan. Stop it already.

Let the test cases be evaluated by the person performing the test – to see the whole picture. And not get biased by expected results. I want the persons performing the tests to use their brain and based on the oracles available evaluate the system under test. Also if everything can be planned – why would there be a need for retakes of movie scenes? It turns out even simple instructions are not possible:

Exact Instructions Challenge – THIS is why my kids hate me. | Josh Darnit

Let people do what they are best at

Let’s have testing being a balanced approach, where people evaluate and scripts confirm.

When the confirmation can be determined by an algorithm or by assertions towards an oracle we can code a test for it – and test it continuously. Adding as much automation as (practically) possible, aids the delivery in multiple ways. It aids to build regression testing and help us test that things not only worked once somewhere, but that it works again and again.

On the other hand when there’s no algorithm or explicit oracle in the form of specifications, acceptance criteria or similar authority we can only do a subjective evaluation: at that point in time – given the information available. do not neglect the wisdom of subject matter experts testing.

And in the later situation expected results hinder the exploration of whether the system under test fulfills not on the explicit requirements but also the implicit. We really should know better.

Photo by Karolina Grabowska on Pexels.com

#268 – Who Brings in New Knowledge?

Well, if you are reading this – there’s a good chance it’s you. Especially if you read this with the intention of sharing this with your team. I hope you do, obviously 😊. But perhaps it’s unclear whose responsibility it is, to bring new knowledge to the team. Is it always the team manager job – or is it a dedicated person that by role, or by habit, that bring in new knowledge?

Photo by William Fortunato on Pexels.com

#266 – Retraining Yourself for the Future

The local university college has a big sign outside saying: “Retrain Yourself for the Future“. The thing is – what is offered is at best years behind the current practice in the industry. If you certify towards a body of knowledge, you forget about the learning journey and only on the outcome. Innovation yet happens in many ways – and industry practitioners are only one form to train for.

#263: There is a Model for your Trouble

Often directors, managers and other decision makers talks about an advanced challenge they have: What can we automate, who should automate and what tools to pick. There more and more I listen, the more I hear – they have not applied any models of the problem at hand. And there usually is a model of the problem space already. Any old model is preferable over no model at all. But it can be hard to see in the middle of chaos.

Implementing Change – First Steps

TL;DR: Stepping into the deep water – have a few supporting first steps.

Photo by Francesco Ungaro on Pexels.com

Inspiration: Ministry of Testing Bloggers Club August Challenge and My three step recipe for overcoming procrastination

Calculating Time To Information

The key metric for any knowledge work – IT deliveries and testing in particular – is more than Mean Time to Repair (MTTR). While fixing fast matters – timing is everything. Timing in getting information to the people who needs it to make decisions. It’s no use if you can turn the ship around on a plate now, if you needed it yesterday. Key elements in calculating time to information is how far away the information is and how evolved the information is.

Explore, Code and Business

There are plenty of contexts where testing happens that doesn’t formally involve testers, or formally involve a testing phase. Still contexts like those have testing as an implicit activity.

We are neglecting the business know-how when all we talk about wrt. smarter testing is either the practices of exploration or of coding. Let’s bring in smarter testing for the business and coding sides too.

Someone else will do it

The testing activity has been under change for long. And it’s clear that the testing activity has shifted. Even the test managers have to re-calibrate – as other roles will be doing the test management activity. Be prepared, as someone else will do your testing job. Work on building self-reliance in others and be prepared to hand-over what you can do.

There is more to testing than testing specialists punching test cases. The testing activity as such, has shifted (both left and right), and testing is being done by more roles than “testing people”. Depending on the context, the explicit testing activity is done by a mix of developers, testing specialists, end users and others.

I often find myself as the only testing person on the project. The testing activity is done by automation specialists and end users in one project, and by technical operations staff and end users in another. In these projects either the technology or the business knowledge is paramount, and not so much exploration, flaws and edge cases for specialized testers to explore.

me, 2020. YMMV

Similarly for the test managers – there’s a trend/shift, that sometimes the test management activity is shifting away from the test managers. Even to me – even if I’m sometimes more an a “project manager of the testing activity“, a “Test coach” or similar. The trend is already there – coined sometimes as “whole team approach to quality“. Yes, most of the test management activity can be done by scrum masters, Release Train Engineers and even project managers ….

Recently I was asked to assist a large transition project for a holding company with many brands. Each brand had their own applications and technology stack, but the holding company had decided to move the hosting. So the holding company’s Project Management Office (PMO) was put in charge of facilitating the brand’s testing activities – an activity they had never considered nor done before. My role would only be to provide guidance, not do the actual facilitation.

Which got me thinking….

What if the testers, are not testers
– but other "titles" doing testing.
And what if the facilitation of this activity is done by
– others than test managers

then – then what do YOU do. pic.twitter.com/471AcRiFru

— Jesper (@jlottosen) May 15, 2020

And after some deep thinking. – I do have the privilege to be able to adapt. I don’t need to hoard knowledge or make power moves (anymore) or worry about health-coverage or any of the lower Maslow pyramid terms (anymore).

It’s very natural for me to hand over project approaches to my co-workers. I’m often on the “blue team” to outline the strategy, My best field of work is to bring clarity and consistency, not scalability or repeatability to the practise.

I naturally hand over learning anyways, so why not re-calibrate when the thing I do has reached a stage, where it’s repeatable. And then focus on building the skills in others, work myself out of the test management role as we know it.

And don’t worry that someone else will eventually do my (testing and test management) job. The first step is to acknowledge the trend/pattern, second to redefine and bring clarity! Let’s explore and see what we find!

Someone else will do the building, not Emmet. Their task is repeatable.