Software Testing Blog

Having just finished Steve Jobs biography, and being of the school of gated platforms – at least for my phone, where I don’t want to deal with bugs the way I might in my work laptop (sorry Matt B and the uTest IT team) – I found this concept very interesting.

According to the BI article, “Android Hackers Plan App Store of Banned Apps,” a group of Android Developers are looking to start their own app store for all the banned and rejected apps that didn’t make the cut.  The article includes a quote from the potential founder that, “apps removed from the Market include, one-click root apps, emulators, tether apps, Visual Voicemail apps, and more.”

It sounds great but we already know about the growing number of malware on phone operating systems, the Android especially.  The other alternative for apps is to create mobile-specific landing pages (i.e. HTML5 apps), like Grooveshark (music) and Untappd (beer reviews) have done, making the apps available via your mobile browser.  Since their launch, Untappd has launched a native app for iOS and Android but has not shared details on traffic comparisons.  [It won’t be applicable to most mobile users but we cover some security exploits and common attacks in our Security Testing whitepaper.]

Am I the only one uber-sensitive about the integrity of my phones OS and Apps?  Would you download an app that isn’t scrutinized for security?

Think optimizing for mobile web isn’t important? Think again! This was reported by PCWorld:

Tablet computers will eventually replace laptops, according to nearly half of Americans polled earlier this month.

But don’t panic yet …

Of course, “eventually” is a very long time, and the recent rollout of Amazon’s Kindle Fire and anticipation over the Apple iPad 3 might have survey takers overreaching a bit.

While the Poll Position phone survey of 1,155 registered voters found great enthusiasm for tablet computers, with 46% saying tablets would surpass laptops eventually, 35% said tablets will not replace laptops and 19% had no opinion.

Among younger Americans (18-29 age group), 49% said tablets will not replace the PC and 37% said they will. A higher percentage of men (53%) than women (39%) foresee tablets overtaking laptops.

The tablet market was hot last year and is expected to remain so this year. IDC recently said it expected 2011 worldwide tablet shipments to total more than 63 million units, with Apple selling about 6 in 10 of those. Recent Canalys figures show a total PC market of 356 million units in 2011, minus tablets.

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One of the biggest fears of companies developing new software or app or launching a new website is that some fundamental bug will slip through the testing cracks and only rear its ugly head post-launch.

That fear is compounded these days now that review sites and social media make it effortless for dissatisfied customers to voice their grievances not only to their friends, co-workers and next store neighbors, but to all the friends, co-workers, next store neighbors they’ve ever known. Plus a slue of strangers they don’t actually know.

Now, in addition to written complaints and bad reviews, the general public can share images of software bugs. Check out this story on TechCrunch about a guy who posted images of Facebook bugs on Pinterest (think of his board as flypaper for Facebook bugs):

Former Facebook engineer (and current Phabricator creator) Evan Priestley has taken the opposite route; In the spirit of coding excellence, Priestly has created a Pinterest log of over 30 Facebook bugs he’s tracked since September 2011. It’s really impressive.

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A few months ago I wrote about a high school computer teacher who worked mobile app development and testing into his curriculum. Well, it looks like he’s not alone. According to British news site The Register, Michael Gove, a member of the British Parliament who also serves as Education Secretary, is proposing a major revamp to the country’s computer education program. Here’s part of the Register article (emphasis added):

Education Secretary Michael Gove today proposed killing off Blighty’s ICT curriculum in September to give it a thorough reboot.

Launching a consultation into his plans, Gove suggested that from the start of the next academic year, schools should be able to teach what they want in computer classes. The Tory minister recommended MIT’s Scratch – a programming language for newbies – and the Microsoft and Google-approved Computing at School course for 11 to 13-year-olds.

The current ICT curriculum is “dull and demotivating”, he said in his speech to the BETT conference, and tweaks to qualifications and the curriculum in past have not led to “significant improvements”. …

Outlining the plan for 2012-14, Gove said:

Technology in schools will no longer be micro-managed by Whitehall. By withdrawing the Programme of Study, we’re giving teachers freedom over what and how to teach, revolutionising ICT as we know it. …

Imagine the dramatic change which could be possible in just a few years, once we remove the roadblock of the existing ICT curriculum. Instead of children bored out of their minds being taught how to use Word and Excel by bored teachers, we could have 11-year-olds able to write simple 2D computer animations using an MIT tool called Scratch. By 16, they could have an understanding of formal logic previously covered only in University courses and be writing their own apps for smartphones.

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Need to find a nearby restaurant? There’s an app for that. Want to track your workout progress? There’s an app for that. Want to play a game to kill the time? There’s an app for that. Your kids want to play a game? There’s an app for that. Want to check the score? There’s an app for that. Want the latest headlines/facebook status updates/tweets? There’s an app for that. Want to access that document or program you use at work on the go? Maybe there’s an app for that, kind of.

Many consumer apps have figured out how to cater to the specific limitations of mobile devices (screen size variance, touch screen usability, the range of OS options) but professional apps are still largely lagging behind.

Quinton Alsbury (who owns a company – MeLLmo – that develops apps for businesses) highlighted where many business-minded apps are going wrong in this guest post on CNet:

We’ve all been there–squinting at a spreadsheet on a mobile device, zooming in and out in attempt to make sense of the information. Each swipe of the finger triggers a blank screen as the data renders and slowly reappears and our frustration builds. …

Why do apps aimed at business users continue to cram features and functionalities designed for the PC into a mobile phone, ignoring all the things that make consumer apps successful–namely, design, speed, and interactivity?

Many business app developers are fundamentally misunderstanding the mobile user experience by producing “shrink to fit” versions of solutions designed for the PC. The mobile experience isn’t about accessing several gigabytes of data; it’s about quickly accessing the information you need, when you need it.

By “shrinking” existing PC tools, they’re essentially jamming a large, complicated, and bulky system onto a smaller screen. What results are apps that contain too many features, respond too slowly and ultimately result in low user adoption and usage.

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I can’t say testing was ever easy but there definitely was a time when there were far fewer components to the testing matrix. Now a days, if you’re just trying to put together a simple website there’s a whole range of browsers to consider at the very least – not to mention the ever updating versions of those browsers.

If that wasn’t enough, now you have to make sure that website works on the miniature screens of mobile devices (which themselves offer a whole gamut of sizes). And I’m not taking “should work” or something to consider if you want to be hip and trendy … because it’s not a trend, trends go away. Instead, time spent browsing the web on mobile devices is steadily increasing. Here’s the most recent statistic from Net Applications (which has been monitoring web usage across their 40,000 websites since 2004), as reported by CNet:

If you haven’t whipped your Web site into shape for easy viewing on small-screen devices, you’d better get cracking.

That’s because the use of mobile devices reached an all-time high in December, accounting for 7.7 percent of browser usage according to Net Applications’ measurements of daily visits to its network of 40,000 Web sites. That may still be a small fraction of total Web traffic, but it’s a large and growing population in absolute numbers.

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Earlier in December Rafe Needleman, a writer at CNet, began posting daily gems of advice called “Startup Secrets.” They are short and sweet and include a memorable quote from a variety of people. So far, we’re up to 12 secrets. While they’re all good, I wanted to highlight a few particularly pertinent to software and mobile development and testing.

Startup Secret No. 3: Support is Product

“Make sure the support fits the product.”
–Josh Weinberg, The Digital Life Consulting Group

So, today’s puzzlers are: Who are your users? Where are they? How do they use your product? And how can you make the experience of using your support as close as possible to using the product itself?

Startup Secret No. 6: Live the Shirt

“Believe in your f***ing self” –Dave McClure‘s T-Shirt

I love Dave’s shirt, because this is what entrepreneurship is really about. Pushing, pushing, pushing. Pushing your idea, pushing yourself, and pushing through the dismissive and small-minded negativity from people who don’t share your passion.

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IBM released this year’s “5 in 5” list – a tradition where they make five, slightly science fiction-y, predictions about tech we’ll have in the next five years. This year’s list:

1. People power will come to life
2. You will never need a password again
3. Mind reading is no longer science fiction
4. The digital divide will cease to exist
5. Junk mail will become priority mail

While those seem awesome, some of them also seem pretty far fetched (mind reading?). But as it turns out … most of these concepts are not only in the works, they’re already here (albeit in a rough form). Let’s take a look:

1. People power will come to life.

IBM says:
“In five years you be able to power your house with the energy you create yourself.”

How it’s already here:
PaveGen tiles have been turning the kinetic energy of footsteps into harvest-able electricity for a few years now and 20 of the tiles will be in place at a busy pedestrian mall in London in time for the 2012 Olympics. The slabs are expected to generate enough power to light half of the location’s outdoor lamps.

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‘Tis the season to prognosticate.

We’re 17 days away from the new year, and far before Auld Lang Syne begins playing and we pretend to know the words (after all the champagne, who can remember the lyrics we optimistically Google’d the day before anyways?), we’re pondering what changes are in store for us the next twelve months.

In a whitepaper released by ABI Research this week, their tech analysts took a collective look into the crystal ball for 2012 and (in their words) “have drawn some bold lines in the sand on a plethora of top-of-mind topics.”

But instead of predicting what WOULD happen in the mobile and telecom space, they took a different spin on the usual list and forecasted what WOULDN’T happen.  Nice twist.  (And a really good read.)

One of their more interesting predictions for those of us in software testing is by Patrick Connolly, Senior Analyst of Telematics and Navigation:  “Indoor location will NOT become commonplace in 2012.” 

It’s easy to see how this could be true…but also surprising.

After all, for as many articles that have been written about the technological challenges in making Indoor Location Based Services (LBS) a reality, there has been an equal amount of big name, big buzz announcements about it over the past few months.  There are dozens of industry-leading companies—including Apple, Navteq, Qualcomm and Nokia—tackling the challenge from every angle.

There are even some major apps launching to give Indoor LBS a jolt from vision to reality.  For instance, Google announced on their Mobile blog in November that the new Google Maps 6.0 gives users (on Android OS 2.1 mobile devices) the ability to Map the Vast Indoors, vis-à-vis:

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The newest issue of eWeek arrived today wrapped in a white, matte, heavyweight cover “introducing” eWeek Digital. Once I tore my eyes away from the image of the sleek iPad sporting Steve Jobs’ face that took up the middle of the page (I’m an admitted Applephile) I got to the three little paragraphs at the bottom corner of the page. The top one talked about the “same award winning coverage.” The second paragraph dropped this line on subscribers: “Exclusively available on a new digital platform.” The third paragraph drove it home: “There is no time to lose… This could be your last issue!”

eWeek is ceasing publication of its print magazine and will offer only a digital edition. And it’s not alone. Let’s explore this trend of print publications moving to online or digital only editions and who it’s effecting most.

With the explosion of digital readers and tablets we’ve seen many major publications start producing digital versions of their traditional paper offerings. But in the late aughts (2007-2009-ish) we started seeing something new … publications completely abandoning their print versions in favor of a digital-only option. That trend slowed down in 2010 but has come back stronger than ever this year. Here’s a look at the digital-only timeline:

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