Testing Blog
How Google Tests Software - Part Six
Monday, May 2, 2011
By James Whittaker
The Life of an SET
SETs are Software Engineers in Test. They are software engineers who happen to write testing functionality. First and foremost, SETs are developers and the role is touted as a 100% coding role in our recruiting literature and internal job promotion ladders. When SET candidates are interviewed, the “coding bar” is nearly identical to the SWE role with more emphasis that SETs know how to test the code they create. In other words, both SWEs and SETs answer coding questions. SETs are expected to nail a set of testing questions as well.
As you might imagine, it is a difficult role to fill and it is entirely possible that the low numbers of SETs isn’t because Google has created a magic formula for productivity but more of a result of adapting our engineering practice around the reality that the SET skill set is really hard to find. We optimize on this very important task and build processes around the people who do it.
It is usually the case that SETs are not involved early in the design phase. Their exclusion is not so much purposeful as it is a by-product of how a lot of Google projects are born. A common scenario for new project creation is that some informal 20% effort takes a life of its own as an actual Google branded product. Gmail and Chrome OS are both projects that started out as ideas that were not formally mandated by Google but over time grew into shipping products with teams of developers and testers working on them. In such cases early development is not about quality, it is about proving out a concept and working on things like scale and performance that must be right before quality could even be an issue. If you can't build a web service that scales, testing is not your biggest problem!
Once it is clear that a product can and will be built and shipped, that's when the development team seeks out test involvement.
You can imagine a process like this: someone has an idea, they think about it, write experimental code, seek out opinions of others, write some more code, get others involved, write even more code, realize they are onto something important, write more code to mold the idea into something that they can present to others to get feedback ... somewhere in all this an actual project is created in Google's project database and the project becomes real. Testers don't get involved until it becomes real.
Do all real projects get testers? Not by default. Smaller projects and those meant for limited users often get tested exclusively by the people who build it. Others that are riskier to our users or the enterprise (much more about risk later) get testing attention.
The onus is on the development teams to solicit help from testers and convince them that their project is exciting and full of potential. Dev Directors explain their project, progress and ship schedule to Test Directors who then discuss how the testing burden is to be shared and agree on things like SWE involvement in testing, expected unit testing levels and how the duties of the release process are going to be shared. SETs may not be involved at project inception, but once the project becomes real we have vast influence over how it is to be executed.
And when I say "testing" I don't just mean exercising code paths. Testers might not be involved from the beginning ... but
testing
is. In fact, an SET's impact is felt even before a developer manages to check code into the build. Stay tuned to understand what I am talking about.
1 comment :
amertum
May 3, 2011 at 12:49 PM
Can't wait for the next part. I really like the way you work because it is an adaptive path.
Reply
Delete
Replies
Reply
Add comment
Load more...
Labels
Aaron Jacobs
1
Adam Porter
1
Alan Faulkner
1
Alan Myrvold
1
Alberto Savoia
4
Alek Icev
2
Alex Eagle
1
Allen Hutchison
6
Andrew Trenk
8
Android
1
Anthony Vallone
25
Antoine Picard
1
APIs
2
App Engine
1
April Fools
2
Arif Sukoco
1
Bruce Leban
1
C++
11
Chaitali Narla
2
Christopher Semturs
1
Chrome
3
Chrome OS
2
Dave Chen
1
Diego Salas
2
Dmitry Vyukov
1
Dori Reuveni
1
Eduardo Bravo Ortiz
1
Ekaterina Kamenskaya
1
Erik Kuefler
3
Espresso
1
George Pirocanac
2
Google+
1
Goranka Bjedov
1
GTAC
54
Hank Duan
1
Harry Robinson
5
Havard Rast Blok
1
Hongfei Ding
1
James Whittaker
42
Jason Arbon
2
Jason Elbaum
1
Jason Huggins
1
Java
5
JavaScript
7
Jay Han
1
Jessica Tomechak
1
Jim Reardon
1
Jobs
14
Joe Allan Muharsky
1
Joel Hynoski
1
John Penix
1
John Thomas
3
Jonathan Rockway
1
Jonathan Velasquez
1
Julian Harty
5
Julie Ralph
1
Karin Lundberg
1
Kaue Silveira
1
Kevin Graney
1
Kirkland
1
Kurt Alfred Kluever
1
Lesley Katzen
1
Marc Kaplan
3
Mark Ivey
1
Mark Striebeck
1
Marko Ivanković
1
Markus Clermont
3
Michael Bachman
1
Michael Klepikov
1
Mike Wacker
1
Misko Hevery
32
Mobile
2
Mona El Mahdy
1
Noel Yap
1
Patricia Legaspi
1
Patrick Copeland
23
Patrik Höglund
5
Peter Arrenbrecht
1
Phil Rollet
1
Philip Zembrod
4
Pooja Gupta
1
Radoslav Vasilev
1
Rajat Dewan
1
Rajat Jain
1
Rich Martin
1
Richard Bustamante
1
Roshan Sembacuttiaratchy
1
Ruslan Khamitov
1
Sean Jordan
1
Sharon Zhou
1
Shyam Seshadri
4
Simon Stewart
2
Stephen Ng
1
Tejas Shah
1
Test Analytics
1
Tony Voellm
2
TotT
54
Vojta Jína
1
WebRTC
2
Yvette Nameth
2
Zhanyong Wan
6
Zuri Kemp
2
Archive
2015
December
November
October
August
June
May
April
March
February
January
2014
December
November
October
September
August
July
June
May
April
March
February
January
2013
December
November
October
August
July
June
May
April
March
January
2012
December
November
October
September
August
2011
November
October
September
August
July
June
May
How Google Tests Software - Part Seven
GTAC 2011 Open for Submission
How Google Tests Software - A Break for Q&A
How Google Tests Software - Part Six
April
March
February
January
2010
December
November
October
September
August
July
June
May
April
March
February
January
2009
December
November
October
September
August
July
June
May
April
February
January
2008
December
November
October
September
August
July
June
May
April
March
February
January
2007
October
September
August
July
June
May
April
March
February
January
Feed
Follow @googletesting
Can't wait for the next part. I really like the way you work because it is an adaptive path.
ReplyDelete