rspec users - Oct 2008 - Slides from my talk on Cucumber + Celerity + RSpec tonight

Hi all

Just ran a session known as a "huddle" in GeekUp terms.  GeekUp[1] is
a group of monthly events in North West England.  The Sheffield one  
starts with a huddle every month, which is intended to have more  
audience participation than a pure talk.  For this one, I got an  
unsuspecting audience (of developers, designers, business analysts,  
project managers, and itinerant alcoholics stumbling past our end of  
the bar) writing user stories and fighting^H^H^H^H^H discussing in a  
civilised manner which was most important.

Second half was a tech demo, and they all loved Cucumber.  So hats off  
to everyone involved in RSpec Stories and to Aslak for its recent re- 
incarnation, it had a room full of geeks going "I want that for my PHP  
code!".

Slides are on my blog[2] for anyone that wants a flick through, or to  
find out more about what went on.

Ashley

[1] http://geekup.org/
[2]
http://aviewfromafar.net/2008/10/2/geekup-sheffield-vi-from-specification-to-success

-- 
http://www.patchspace.co.uk/
http://aviewfromafar.net/

On Thu, Oct 2, 2008 at 5:30 AM, Ashley Moran
<ashley.moran at patchspace.co.uk> wrote:
> Hi all
>
> Just ran a session known as a "huddle" in GeekUp terms. 
GeekUp[1] is a
> group of monthly events in North West England.  The Sheffield one starts
> with a huddle every month, which is intended to have more audience
> participation than a pure talk.  For this one, I got an unsuspecting
> audience (of developers, designers, business analysts, project managers,
and
> itinerant alcoholics stumbling past our end of the bar) writing user
stories
> and fighting^H^H^H^H^H discussing in a civilised manner which was most
> important.
>
> Second half was a tech demo, and they all loved Cucumber.  So hats off to
> everyone involved in RSpec Stories and to Aslak for its recent
> re-incarnation, it had a room full of geeks going "I want that for my
PHP
> code!".
>
> Slides are on my blog[2] for anyone that wants a flick through, or to find
> out more about what went on.
>
Thanks a lot for sharing Ashley.

This is a really good introduction to BDD. Short enough to be
graspable for people who are new to it - long enough to be really
valuable. I can imagine you had a good time! I really like that you
started off by talking about business value (So that). The two
sentences about acceptance criteria (verifiable by humans and discrete
for machines) really nail down what BDD acceptance criteria are about.

I''m ccing the Celerity crew - they also live here in Oslo.

BTW - if you are developing an open source conference organising tool,
please let me know. I''ve written two that suck (one in Rails, one as a
Radiant extension) and I want something good for the next conference I
organise.

Cheers,
Aslak
> Ashley
>
> [1] http://geekup.org/
> [2]
>
http://aviewfromafar.net/2008/10/2/geekup-sheffield-vi-from-specification-to-success
>
> --
> http://www.patchspace.co.uk/
> http://aviewfromafar.net/
>
> _______________________________________________
> rspec-users mailing list
> rspec-users at rubyforge.org
> http://rubyforge.org/mailman/listinfo/rspec-users
>

On Oct 02, 2008, at 6:07 am, aslak hellesoy wrote:
> Thanks a lot for sharing Ashley.
>
> This is a really good introduction to BDD. Short enough to be
> graspable for people who are new to it - long enough to be really
> valuable. I can imagine you had a good time! I really like that you
> started off by talking about business value (So that). The two
> sentences about acceptance criteria (verifiable by humans and discrete
> for machines) really nail down what BDD acceptance criteria are about.
Hi Aslak

Yeah!  It was fun.  The interactivity worked better than I expected.   
I think it made it sink in too.  One thing I''ve learnt about stories  
is they are very academic until users see real software that  
implements them.

> I''m ccing the Celerity crew - they also live here in Oslo.
I haven''t used it extensively but I''m already a big fan of it.
One
guy last night said that Cucumber + Celerity has completely renewed  
his interest in automated acceptance testing, after giving up on FIT  
and Selenium.  He says it''s also the excuse he needs to learn Ruby (he
does all C-pound right now), or at least enough to write Cucumber  
files.  And another guy grabbed the slides off me so he could get  
JRuby set up for a new team to use today!

The new killer app (combo) for Ruby? :o)

> BTW - if you are developing an open source conference organising tool,
> please let me know. I''ve written two that suck (one in Rails, one
as a
> Radiant extension) and I want something good for the next conference I
> organise.
We''re doing it specifically for BarCamp Sheffield 2008 (end of  
November) at first, but I''d love to expand it.  When''s your
next
conference likely to be?


Ashley


-- 
http://www.patchspace.co.uk/
http://aviewfromafar.net/