Christopher Shefler

Developer downtime: don’t overwork your devs. It’s memorial weekend and I’m lazily sitting on my porch. My kids keep coming in and out of the house, but get stuck because the sliding door keeps coming off the rails and won’t open. Well, since I’ve got nothing else scheduled for the afternoon I investigate the issue. Turns out sliding doors have a bunch of adjustment screws. I adjust them till the door slides smooth. Left in the broken state my kids learned to hit top left side of the door before opening it. Bringing this back to work, I know customer success teams that have a cheat sheet of these maneuvers. Give devs space to observe, we naturally fix these issues.

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Big O notation I knew how underpaid I was when I had to sit between two developers that struggled to insert data from a csv file in a database and return what didn't work to the user. It wasn't such a big file but we had timeouts. They banged their head during 2 days, before I could go support them. We reduced the complexity from O(3n) to O(n) in less than 1 hour. It was in 2015, we where in .NET and instead of populating an array from a stream then looping over this array to insert valid elements into a table and return the user what we couldn't handle. The yield keyword saved the day (and the understanding of what happened too) We went from 1. Stream -> array of strings (1st loop) 2. Array of strings -> Objects (2nd loop) 3. Objects to valid / invalid lists (3rd loop) to: 1. Read the line (yield the result) 2. Create object from a line (yield the result) 3. Separate the objects in a list of valid ones and invalid ones based upon business rules (first loop) Reducing the number of loops is a simple yet efficient way to ensure your code performs nicely. And big O notation is a way to measure how performant an algorithm is regardless of the hardware it will run on. It may seem difficult to grasp so I hope the following examples will enlighten you and help you understand your code ! - O(1) - Constant time It's the most efficient you'll find. From a code view, it can be accessing an array by index. - O(log n) - Logarithmic time The second most efficient, it's used in Dictionary / Maps, an implementation example would be doing a binary search in a sorted array. - O(n) - Linear time This one require you to iterate on a whole array. That's what is done in a table scan on a database and why you want to avoid it. Then it's up to you to deduce and adjust for your variations, such as O(n log n) for the mergesort, O(2n), for brute-solving the salesman problem or O(n^2) for the bubble sort. If you don't have the exact formula, it's fine, but at least, be aware of the order of magnitude. Oh, and still on .NET, using Linq the.ToList() and .ToArray() methods loop through the entire array, so, if you have filters, please put them before ! Have a nice day ! #Algorithm #Efficiency

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What I tell devs that take TDD too literally - there’s a time to write tests before the implementation, and there’s a time when you want to explore your implementation’s design and validate it afterward. Don’t take it from me, take it from Uncle Bob. What’s important is that you get an automated way to validate that your code is working as you expect it. Don’t forget that tests are not quality assurance. Tests are a guardrail. And every bug that reaches production has passed through your linters, code reviews, and test suite. Quality comes from your focus on understanding your domain. Because if you implement the wrong logic, chances are you will write your tests around it as well.

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Just a little post for those folks with student loans. As a reminder, those w/ eligible COVID-19 payment paused student loans are in a "on-ramp payment period". During this time, payments are encouraged but not required. Avoiding payments will mean more interest to be paid. More important to note: come October, if you ever had a missed payment during this "on-ramp" period, it will be marked as forbearance and you'll be current. It's about 3-ish months til October, best start getting into a flow of repaying.

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I'm going to post a few challenges I have had as a software QA. I should be relaxing today but those that know me, know my brain is always in thirty places at once. To developers: Trust your QA. Y'all don't know how many times I've heard, "Well, it works on my local". I don't care. In the test environment, it breaks. I do my due diligence to investigate why, present evidence in logs and from the database, present recordings, and meticulously document steps of reproduction and results. And even after, I still get, "It works on my local". Get off the dang local. NO ONE knows this software, app, platform, etc. better than the QA because we live it more than anyone else does. To business analysts: I know you all are overwhelmed. But please stop copying and pasting Acceptance Criteria for similar features. It makes a mess for developers and QA because the AC doesn't match or conflicts with not only the developed feature but integration as well. Which brings me to my next point... What QA is: Everyone thinks of us as just testers. I am sick of that. I spend half my time working with the product owner, BAs, and Devs, just making sure the AC reflects the solution needing to be resolved. I can't tell you how many times I have had to address with the BAs conflicts in a story over AC, nonsensical AC, WTF verbiage, etc. So then the developers get confused and we are in long meetings addressing what is messed up. We are here to help you ask the questions you didn't think to ask. We don't just test..... we look at future issues too. We like process improvements. Automation: Stop asking me to automate a one-off feature test that hasn't even gone through UAT yet. It's time wasted. Too many companies do this. Might as well give me the day off for the time it takes to do that because the automation is useless after UAT. Learn the purpose of automation. Product Owner: When I tell you before a demo not to demo certain things because there are still issues, don't shred me after the demo because you decided to demo them anyway and they break. I TOLD YOU not to do that, and why. Data: QA worst nightmare. My last position I would get two test records to test against 20 AC when I first started. I said "Helz no". I built up a catalog of test records I could use, positive and negative, as I progressed because I want multiple records against every AC. Which I often shared with the developers for their unit tests who loved it. QA needs data, all. You give me two records, don't yell at me that coverage isn't thorough. Probably sounded more a rant. But I'm opinionated. Where many QA are not. And these are common issues. Want to improve QA, improve the above.

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I often participate in interviews and, more often than not, encounter a fairly predictable set of questions. However, there’s one question that really stood out to me: "What advice would you give to help me grow in my career, no matter where I end up?" This was a fantastic question, and I relished the opportunity to answer it because the advice is both simple and powerful: Be proactive in everything you do. Don’t sit back and wait for problems to come to you; seek them out and tackle them head-on. Collaborate with others to find solutions. Your career will flourish when you take the initiative to identify and resolve issues. This proactive approach not only accelerates your growth but also hones your ability to tackle larger and more complex problems over time. There’s never a downside to being proactive and being the one who solves meaningful problems.

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I've observed this before, but by far the hardest issues to deal with as a higher-level dev are not technical, but people and process related. Technical problems become somewhat easier over time, but people related problems tend to become harder. The corollary to this is that managers (really, decision makers, but these are usually managers) have an outsized impact on how well a business runs, by virtue of their influence on people interactions, and how well they make decisions. Good managers can allow people to focus on their areas of strength (ie: for technical people, doing technical work); bad managers compound issues with process and infrastructure, and divert lots of work effort to trying to deal with people related issues (inclusive of trying to influence management decisions). It's actually mind-boggling how much work product can be effectively wasted by having bad management in place; this can literally by 90%+ of potential optimal work effort. It's also ironic that orgs in this position often are unaware of this, and completely unable to address it (because of the circular and self-referential nature of the underlying issue).

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Ok but for real this time (see yesterday's post): I'm a #StaffEngineer. That means I: ✅ Listen. ✅ Ensure our SDLC is solid. ✅ Mentor anyone looking to learn a subject I have expertise in. ✅ Am VERY aware of how fallible my own code is. ✅ Am ALWAYS open to feedback of any kind. ✅ Oh and also, I guess I manage our product from a tech perspective. And I DON'T: 🚫 Lord my experience over anyone, ever. 🚫 Ignore input from anyone, for any reason. 🚫 Use my position as leverage. 🚫 Look down on anyone for asking a genuine question. #code #leadership #SoftwareEngineer

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Pre - I don't need documentation. I will figure this out easily 💪 After sometime - Oops, where am I now? 🫣 Post - Let me take time to read documentation 📃 #softwaredev #humour #softwareengineer #funny #oops

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Everyone keeps talking about Pair Programming but I’m not sure I’m ready for it. I already know C#, TypeScript, JavaScript, PHP, KSH, COBOL, JCL, and a few others. I’m not sure I have room in my brain for another language! Is Pair supported by the .NET framework or is it part of the Node ecosystem or is it something else entirely? What are its advantages? is it easy to learn? I haven’t seen any job postings asking for it. 😂😂😂 #humor #programming

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Over the last few weeks I've been checking out Playwright, and I have to say, I love it. As a tester, who is not an SDET and really doesn't want to be, Playwright seems to remove much of the mystique and pain of traditional, programming heavy automation solutions. I'm sure there are tons of great reasons for using Selenium, including support for the recently deceased IE, but for a tester who just wants to automate a few simple tests, integrate with Git and perhaps a straightforward CI/CD pipeline Playwright is at least 8 million times easier. I needed to put together a proof of concept for testing a sports administration customer site, and I looked at Cypress first, but didn't really like it and I'm not 100% certain why, it just felt cumbersome. With Playwright it took very little time to have a simple test up and running using Codegen, and yes, I know, we used to scoff at people who used recorders for automation but this is different. Codegen captures the locators and gives you boiler plate in a couple of lines of code. No Xpath, no messing with page elements that may or may not be visible when you run the tests. Just makes life a little easier and even gives you the imports you need. Building that generated code into a simple page object model is also dead easy. I have my URLs, locators and actions in a nice clean page file, and the tests in spec files. This ease of use makes adding a new page much easier than doing the same task using Selenium and Java, and loads less code, which makes me happy. Persisting login is also easy using a global setup file to capture login state, and store it in an auth.json file, with Playwright using that logged in state for each test by default. To run tests for logged out use cases you just point that test at an empty noauth.json file. Could not be easier. Assertions using expect are simple and logical, and in general I feel much more comfortable with Playwright, and far, far more productive. And that's also true for API tests, although it won't be prising me off Postman just yet, I'll definitely be further exploring API tests in Playwright. Playwright also introduced me to VS Code and I'm liking it greatly. Simple integration with GitHub, nice and easy to step through when debugging and simple clean layout. So what does the professional tester world think about Playwright? Good, bad indifferent? I'd be interested to garner opinions from more experienced automation engineers.

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Java 17 has some great improvements in GC as apparent in this poc. Worth upgrading applications and seeing how much impact you observe! POC Highlights: 1. GC frequency reduced from 800 to 100-150 events 2. GC time reduced by 50% 3. GC triggers at 5 GB compared to 2.5 GB in Java 8. This shows Java 17 uses memory optimally. https://lnkd.in/gVQG6tg8 #java #gc

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Want to get your claim denials FASTER when testing or doing live medical billing? We have an app for that! Most payers actually adjudicate claims fairly quickly, but then you have to WAIT DAYS or WEEKS for the ERA results. Cut that time to HOURS with our Claim Status Reporter product. Once the payer has adjudicated your claims (usually within hours), sending a CSR batch to the payer will give you THE SAME PAYMENT DETAILS as the ERA only MUCH FASTER!! Contact me, the "EDI Doctor" for further details - Have a great day (Smile) #ediservices #medicalbilling #medicalbillingservices #edidoctor #revenuecyclemanagement #edi #edihealthcare #edi835 #edi837 #edi837d #remittanceadvice #editransaction #edi835claimset #x12 #insuranceeligibilityverification #eligibilityverification

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I’ve always had two jobs. The first is my day job. The job that uses the skills I already have and pays the bills. Most of us have this one. Even if there are multiple first jobs they still fall into the “first job” category. The second job is optional. It’s the job of self-education. What skills do I want to learn? Where do I want to grow? What should I prepare for? What should I practice? When the next opportunity comes along I’m able to seize it. Sure, we all learn on the job, I lean into that as well. Sometimes I get to seize a level up in my current company and sometimes I move on. The majority of my success comes down to always being a step or two ahead by always having two jobs not just one. Always moving. Always growing. Always preparing. It’s not hustle culture, it’s simply a wise move.

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As a #StaffEngineer, part of your role is going to be helping maintain your #TestSuite. Two questions for you: 1) If your test suite is green, can you push to prod RIGHT NOW with a high degree of confidence that nothing will explode? 2) If your test suite is red after running your e2e tests ONLY ONCE APIECE, do you have a high degree of certainty that something is actually wrong? If your answer to either of these questions is anything but an immediate "yes," your test suite isn't doing its job! Wanna hear more? Of course you do! Come hear me speak on maintaining a solid test suite on May 14 in Raleigh! Buy tickets here: https://lnkd.in/endei_Q3 Pictured below: An engineer stressing out over the "only once apiece" bit up there. Yes, it really is achievable!

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Not sure that it's a good idea, but I often write "tests" that are helpful for debugging. For xUnit it's easy to extend the Fact-attribute to make a test only run while debugging. Since the Explicit-attribute was no longer supported well, I strugled a bit with NUnit. But found out that it could be solved using the Ignore-attribute. Is there a better way? #dotnet #testing #debuging #NUnit

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Study finds 268% higher failure rates for Agile software projects "One standout statistic was that projects with clear requirements documented before development started were 97 percent more likely to succeed ." This interesting article is a great indicator of the need of moving away from Agile and adopting other methodologies that focus on productivity and the actual characteristics that help with producing software more efficiently. Many companies are already on that wagon and have never looked back. Here is the article: https://lnkd.in/ddVgfyYD

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