From Hack to Engineer

I talked about people being the most important tool of Test Engineering. People are the most important factor in any Engineering discipline. People, Engineers, are the constant though out development. No matter how good or thorough the processes are people still have to implement them. And if the processes are not good the people still have to develop the product.

There are several levels of skill that go along with doing the job of Engineer. A hack (not be be confused with hacker) learns as he goes, acts and then thinks, and cleans up his messes only when he absolutely has to, if he can't pass it on to someone else.

Then theirs the craftsman Engineer. He studies, he plans, uses his best practices and tools and takes pride in his work. But a craftsman is not to the level of Engineer because while, he develops a well crafted product, it lacks predictability and certainty.

Then theirs Engineers. With Engineers it's all about knowing instead of guessing. An Engineer doesn't estimate, he/she calculates. An Engineer doesn't hope, he knows. Estimates can formed based on what they devise. Engineers basically have consistency.

Consistency is what Engineers are about. They still need the hack characteristic of learning as they go and the craftsman characteristic of using best practices and tools.

The best way to get a good product is to have good Engineers working on the product. We also need to encourage and train the hack Engineer to become a Craftsman. We also need to encourage and train the craftsman Engineer to become a real Engineer.

Test Engneers

Most people dealing with Automated Test Equipment (ATE) call themselves “test engineer’s” (TE) or test people. However, since there is typically no degree’s in test engineering, they get degrees in Electrical engineering or software engineering or computer science and engineering and then are recruited in the “test group”. I’ve seen most TE’s come out of the group with EE degrees, a lot of SW Engineers don’t like to touch hardware. But then a lot of EE’s feel that doing software makes them dirty or is FM (Freaking Magic) and only took minimal, how to code classes in college.

Since most TE’s are out of EE the software portion of ATE is “hacked” out (the old-school meaning of hack, to bang out code until it works) the code is less than optimal. In other-words, it works for the normal case and little else.

Some people who have software degrees or have been doing software for a long time work toward having more software discipline in there ATE code, but it still tends to be lacking in most area’s. Software tools tend to go unused or limited use, some believe an IDE is all that is needed.

There’s more to developing software than just an IDE and some time. Tools are available to help develop code. I think software tools aren’t used in test due to a lack of understanding, lack of knowledge, and lack of patience.