Dave on Software Testing

Dave Winer, The lost art of software testing:

I think all developers go through the initial hatred of the tester, feeling unloved, and depressed because the labor of our love is so awfully buggy, broken and badly designed! Oh. But you eventually come to see that knowledge is power.

I’m not sure that the art is actually lost, though it’s certainly less common than it should be. Nick Arnott has tested most releases of Vesper, and he’s amazing. Best tester I’ve ever worked with. (I like to joke that he hates my guts and is trying to kill me — that’s just what it feels like sometimes when a tester is doing a great job.)

And there are companies such as Omni who have testing departments, and who are, by all accounts, similarly great.