QA Hates You

Look inside yourself, like Crucified Barbara, and see if you share the malady: “My Heart Is Black“.

Caution, f-word.

Rodney Atkins is a country singer, but he sings about the testing phase of any project as though he’s lived it: “If You’re Going Through Hell (Before the Devil Even Knows)”.

You have to get a little calloused to work in QA. Therefore, as a public service, we here at QAHY offer a small portion of our training media.

Which reminds me, I have to book the conference room for the annual screening of The Wall.

Here’s a song that is fifteen years old already: “Everything Falls Apart” by Dog’s Eye View.

It’s a song about weakness in relationships, but I think that’s a metaphor for the flaws in the SDLC and the countervailing tensions involved in the business and the technology of building a product people will use. Or maybe I have to say that since I wanted to listen to this song.

Screw the fluff, let’s start the week with some punk. Here are The Distillers with “The World Comes Tumblin’ Down”.

Be advised the song has the f-word in it. The advice: Turn it up.

You know, I worked once in a corporate environment where we had to set personal and team goals for a year. So we sat around in several days’ worth of meetings to come up with the most basic bullet points that we could probably hit as a team and vague notions of our self-improvement to ensure we would get annual bonuses and not embarrass our division.

It wasn’t even that big of a company.

But for those of you who are facing that situation as we go into December, here’s a little research material:

That should be on your list somewhere.

(Thanks to El Guapo for the suggeston.)

Reverend Horton Heat, “The Devil’s Chasing Me”:

I’ll leave it to you to determine whether QA is doing the chasing or being chased in the metaphor most applicable to your situation.

Jethro Tull describes the SDLC:

Would it be so frightening to have QA at your shoulder?

Given the more mellow sounds you’ve been hearing here recently, you’re probably skeptical of this post, fearing that I’m going to uncork “It’s Raining Men” on you.

Fear not. It’s just Slayer.

And try to use those two sentences in conversation today: “Fear not. It’s just Slayer.” Especially if you blurt them out in a meeting where you’re discussing problems with database commits. Because those sentences always allay fears.

I’d make some metaphor here about how keeping your teams segregated makes a QA ghetto, but it’s failing me now.

Let Bobby Womack explain it:

I think this is how a lot of designers get into the Web business.

It ain’t pretty when the pretty leaves you with no place to go.

The journey in this song reflects how many people end up in QA, I think.

This is the freak show, baby, anyhow.

A little The Lonely Island to start the week.

Sadly, it’s the last lifeboat off this sinking project, guys, and QA ain’t on it.

If you do QA right, you carry a certain swagger, knowing that your organization is putting out good product and you’re playing an important role in it.

Ain’t that tuff enough?

Yeah, you’re all that.

Of course, if your organization isn’t doing it right, your theme song should be the sound of a laser printer spitting out your resume. How quaint that notion is!

Rick Springfield, ca 1984:

The mullet is the hairstyle for QA. If I had enough hair left for one, you’d better believe I’d have one. It’s so hard to effectively and aesthetically thrash with a buzz cut.

Here’s a song that captures the countervailing currents of absurdity omnipresent in the SDLC process through the metaphor of living in the United States:

Or maybe he’s singing about living in the United States but it really reminds me of working in QA.

Hey, to celebrate that hastily cobbled together Friday build delivered just in time for the developers to leave on time, QAHY presents the theme song for Sanford and Son:

Thanks, guys! We’ll be glad to work late on Friday night and come in on Saturday to discover just how bollixed you’ve made it.

And since we’re going to be here anyway, we’ll be glad to watch over your empty cubicles and offices to keep them safe.

Frankly, I cannot listen to this song without thinking of a street gang. Did I say a street gang? I meant my QA team.

Love and darkness and my sidearm. Hey, élan, indeed.

And our southside? Conference Room 2, baby. Where the status meeting happens.

Who hasn’t felt like this?

The key is to take it out on the software, brothers and sisters. It’s not just a vocation, it’s therapy.

A bit of Bocephus to start the week:

Sure, it’s a country song, but it’s a gritty country song about self-reliance. You know what? QA ain’t respected much among the cool kids in IT, but we maintain our own machines and computer labs, design and develop tests and test scripts, and divine the ill intentions of developers and project managers and act accordingly. QA can do it all, and sometimes we’d like to spit some beechwood into them dudes’ eyes.

Also, note Junior once fell off of a mountain and broke himself up so badly that his brain was exposed to the open air. And that’s before his best years of recording. He’s tough enough for QA.