STARWEST 2024 - Test Automation Engineer | TechWell

STARWEST 2024 - Test Automation Engineer

Customize your STARWEST 2024 experience with sessions covering test automation for engineers.

Wednesday, September 25

Aprajita-Mathur
Guardant Health
W2

Build Your Career and Your Worth, Not Just Your Relationship with Your Manager

Wednesday, September 25, 2024 - 11:30am to 12:30pm

Change in organizational structure, especially your direct manager, can be very stressful and life altering. After all, people leave managers, not companies right? Aprajita Mathur would disagree. Change is hard for all of us and sometimes losing the person with whom we were so closely aligned and working can be hard to successfully navigate. Aprajita has been blessed to have had over 15+ managers in her career, an average burn rate of 1.5 years or less. Though this was a challenging path at the start of her career, having this vast experience has taught her what really matters in the long...

Kwaan Bear Technology
W3

Building and Testing Serverless API Applications with AWS SAM

Wednesday, September 25, 2024 - 11:30am to 12:30pm

The primary draw for implementation of AWS serverless applications is the supposed simplicity. Anyone that has attempted to implement testing on a serverless application, however, knows that it is anything but simple. Serverless technologies allow for the faster construction of more complex applications with more complex integrations while also providing new technologies and execution environments, all of which pose a challenge to those used to testing in a more traditional way. This presentation looks at an API-based serverless application as an example and introduces how the application...

W5

Delete Responsibly: A Guide to Managing Flaky Tests in iOS UI Automation

Wednesday, September 25, 2024 - 11:30am to 12:30pm

Flaky tests pose a significant challenge in maintaining the reliability and efficiency of UI test suites. This talk delves into practical approaches for handling flaky tests, emphasizing the importance of responsibly removing or rewriting tests that consistently demonstrate flakiness. Join Zhanat to explore strategies such as implementing retries judiciously, utilizing monitoring tools for better oversight, and engaging in collaborative problem-solving sessions with iOS teams to address ambiguous failures. Through real-world examples, attendees will learn how to avoid common pitfalls that...

Disney
W8

Testing Retrospective: Lessons from the Past

Wednesday, September 25, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

We prepare for the future by learning from the lessons of the past. During this session, you will look back at some of the craziest bugs John Jenkins has run across during his career, and see what lessons can be gleaned from them to help tackle the problems of tomorrow. Bugs come in all shapes and sizes, and can exist in processes just as easily as they can exist in code. In this session, both types will be examined, including: the too much free space bug, the V1 bug, the too much test data bug, and more. The session will also explore some of the best practices John has developed in his...

Lisette Zounon
Zsquare Solutions Inc.
W10

Enabling a DevOps Culture with Embedded Systems

Wednesday, September 25, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

In today's technology-driven landscape, where software and hardware intertwine seamlessly in embedded systems, adopting a DevOps culture becomes imperative. This talk delves into the dynamic world of embedded systems and explores how organizations can successfully implement and nurture a DevOps culture within this unique domain. DevOps, with its emphasis on collaboration, automation, and continuous improvement, has revolutionized software development. However, adapting these principles to the realm of embedded systems presents distinct challenges and opportunities. Our discussion will...

Ryan Hoban
Bloomberg
W15

Cautionary Tales in Integration Testing

Wednesday, September 25, 2024 - 2:45pm to 3:45pm

Integration tests are often rife with pitfalls that can result in confusing, flaky, or otherwise completely unmaintainable tests. Those pitfalls can often be mitigated by testing in containers, as this usually provides the most straightforward path to creating ephemeral test environments. Containerized tests typically provide isolation and reproducibility, but they can be costly to initially set up, especially if the system under test is not built for a containerized environment. Nonetheless, there are many benefits to containerized testing, even if the system under test won’t ultimately...

Deepika Kale
Guardant Health
W16

Kafka and Kafka Testing: Streamlining Real-time Data Processing

Wednesday, September 25, 2024 - 2:45pm to 3:45pm

In today's data-driven landscape, real-time data processing is the backbone of modern applications. Kafka, a distributed event streaming platform, has emerged as a critical component in building data-intensive systems. This presentation provides an in-depth exploration of Kafka and the essential practice of Kafka testing, offering attendees valuable insights into harnessing the power of real-time data streams while ensuring robust system reliability. Key topics to be covered are: an introduction to Kafka to understand Kafka's architecture and core components, importance of Kafka Testing,...

Thursday, September 26

Tim Heck
MRI Software
T7

“Low Code”—Coded Automation Using Free Tools

Thursday, September 26, 2024 - 11:15am to 12:15pm

Using artificial intelligence to generate test code is a hybrid automation strategy that combines the best of both worlds. Tests can be created very quickly by almost anyone using AI, yet the tests are still planned by humans and maintainable by humans. With the right prompts, you can have AI construct traditional test code using open source testing tools that the world is already familiar with (Chai, Mocha, Cypress). As a result, you end up with structured code that is logical and easy to maintain without having to wonder what the AI is testing. In this session, Timothy will look at...

Jennie Burger
Western & Southern Financial Group
T8

Navigating the Matrix: The Struggle Is Real—Effective QA Requires More Than Just Technical Skills

Thursday, September 26, 2024 - 11:15am to 12:15pm

Everyone involved in the SDLC knows quality is important. Absolutely. After all, who wants to push out (let alone use) software that doesn't work well? But, does your organization really embrace QA in all its glory? Do they see QA as more than ‘just’ testing? Do you see QA as more than ‘just’ testing? If your answer is 'No' to any of these questions, then this talk is for you. Yes, we test and log defects, but we also have to be diplomatic champions of quality assurance. We have to work to make sure our organizations see QA as a proactive function that spans the Software Development Life...

Anand Gopalakrishnan
Rhythm Management Group
T17

AI-Assisted Exploratory Testing for Healthcare Software Based on STEEEP Domain of Healthcare Quality

Thursday, September 26, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

In this presentation, the primary objective is to introduce an innovative AI-assisted self-generating exploratory test automation model designed specifically for healthcare software applications. The overarching goal of this platform is to elevate the quality assurance process within the realm of healthcare software by dynamically formulating, executing, and adapting test scenarios. These scenarios are meticulously crafted to align with the crucial STEEEP (Safe, Timely, Effective, Efficient, Equitable, and Patient-Centered) healthcare quality domain, thereby fostering an improvement in...

Karen Hsu
Appdome
T18

Cloud Testing of Cybersecurity Features in Mobile Apps

Thursday, September 26, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

In CI/CD pipelines, automated testing services validate functionality of apps across hundreds of real-world mobile devices and OS versions. However, these same automated testing services can use methods and tools that violate security policies such as: emulators, virtualization, resigning, debugging, dual spaces, Magisk and more. Once security protections are added to a mobile app, the security features will trigger and may prevent automated testing. In this session, Karen will discuss how you can eliminate the need to test protected and unprotected builds separately. You will also...

Adam Sandman photo
Inflectra
T19

Multi-Modal GPTs Are Coming For Your Testing! How to Adapt?

Thursday, September 26, 2024 - 3:00pm to 4:00pm

As you research the latest in generative AI technology, you will see that the development and availability of multi-modal GPT engines are fundamentally changing the way applications are tested and described. These new GPT models can generate and interpret voice, text, and images seamlessly. For example, you can ask them to navigate an application to accomplish a business task and comment on their actions. This means that we’re for the first time entering the world of AI-assisted/performed exploratory testing. When you couple this with the capabilities of GPT models to identify UI elements...

Renata Santillan
Parasoft
T20

The Art of Winning Leadership Support for Web Accessibility

Thursday, September 26, 2024 - 3:00pm to 4:00pm

Feeling unheard in your fight for web accessibility? What if you could turn this struggle into a success story? Join this candid conversation on navigating the nuanced journey of integrating accessibility, even when convincing leadership seems like an uphill battle. Together, we'll reflect on Renata's initial stumbles, identify common pitfalls, and strategize to avoid them. Anticipate leadership concerns by understanding deeper motivations behind their resistance. Master the art of speaking their language and tailor your message to resonate with decision-makers. Empower your champions,...

James Wood
Trimble PPM, Inc.
T22

Leveraging and Measuring the Use of Formal Testing Methods in Product Development

Thursday, September 26, 2024 - 3:00pm to 4:00pm

Without training in software testing that includes formal methods such as equivalence class partitioning, boundary value analysis, decision tables, state diagrams, and others, an engineer, in good faith, will test the code intuitively until reaching “qualitative confidence” that testing is sufficient. The team at Trimble, Inc. provided training to engineers in a wide variety of formal testing methods so they could gain “quantitative confidence” that code has been tested sufficiently, by using methods known to achieve concrete coverage in requirements and code. Subsequently, Trimble...

Sufyan Subzwari
DNAMIC AI
T23

Compile to Combat in 24 Hours—The Death of Regression Tests

Thursday, September 26, 2024 - 3:00pm to 4:00pm

As a Quality Engineering Director for a consulting firm delivering innovative data products to the US Department of Defense, Sufyan was faced with a new challenge. The US Government had directed all agencies delivering software solutions to the Department of Defense to provide the ultimate advantage to its warfighters. All software solutions must meet the Compile to Combat (C2C24) directive in that all requests for changes to software being used by the military must be delivered in 24 hours from the point of development to delivery. As a Quality Engineering team, this meant long and...