I work in software quality assurance. I work hard in what is often considered an uninspiring job. In fact, this is my chosen career – not a stepping stone on the path to something else. I love QA. I think I’m a pretty good employee. Let me give you an example of a memorable 15 minutes out of one of my work-days in 2006:
I walk into the QA lab and am bombarded by questions. Tester A cannot get the Palm OS software installed on his OSX machine. Tester B cannot get his OSX machine to connect to the Windows 2003 server and Tester C informs me that one of the toilets in the women’s restroom is continuously flushing.
I instruct Tester A to log in as an admin, dig down to a certain file that the Palm OS installs, and see if it is locked. If it is, unlock it, delete it, then try to re-install the Palm OS. He begins this.
I ask Tester B if Microsoft UAM is installed on his system. He says “no,” so I show him where to get it, instruct him to install it, then try to connect to the server.
I tell tester C to go to the women’s restroom and flush one of the other toilets that isn’t continuously flushing.
It all came together in a glorious Hollywood movie kind of way. Just as Tester B successfully connected to the server, Tester A exclaimed “I can’t believe it; I’ve got the Palm working,” and Tester C dashed into the room to breathlessly inform me that my idea had worked and how did I know how to fix the continuously flushing toilet.
“Genius, my dear, genius,” I replied.