Identity crisis or delusions of grandeur?

In this month's installment of "Peak Performance" I discuss the frequently erroneous and often grandiose titles software testers have on their business cards or in their e-mail SIGs. Identity crisis or delusions of grandeur? 
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Scott Barber
Chief Technologist, PerfTestPlus, Inc.
About.me

Co-Author, Performance Testing Guidance for Web Applications
Author, Web Load Testing for Dummies
Contributing Author, Beautiful Testing, and How To Reduce the Cost of Testing

"If you can see it in your mind...
     you will find it in your life."

Performance Testing Guidance for Web Applications book

Some time back, I blogged about a book I’d been significantly contributing to being available as a free .pdf download. (see the entry here)

Well, the book quietly appeared in “dead tree format” (as Stuart Moncrieff put it in his blog post about the book) a couple of weeks ago and I’ve been getting light heartedly scolded by some of my friends and readers for not making a big announcement, so here’s my “big announcement.”

Performance Testing Guidance for Web Applications

by: J.D. Meier, Scott Barber, Carlos Farre, Prashant Bansode, and Dennis Rea is now available on Amazon.

Reviewed by: Alberto Savoia, Ben Simo, Cem Kaner, Chris Loosley, Corey Goldberg, Dawn Haynes, Derek Mead, Karen N. Johnson, Mike Bonar, Pradeep Soundararajan, Richard Leeke, Roland Stens, Ross Collard, Steven Woody, Alan Ridlehoover, Clint Huffman, Edmund Wong, Ken Perilman, Larry Brader, Mark Tomlinson, Paul Williams, Pete Coupland, and Rico Mariani.

The best part is that you can buy the book on Amazon, download the PDF, browse the HTML, or do any combination of the above.

From The Web: "Noncertified IT pros earn more..."

Stop the presses! Can it be true? The industry wants effective, qualified, multi-dimensional people who are capable of understanding business drivers & risk mitigation and applying that in a sapient way to their job as opposed to folks who paid someone to teach them how to pass a multiple-choice exam?!? Amazing!

 

Noncertified IT pros earn more than certified counterparts: survey

 
--
Scott Barber
Chief Technologist, PerfTestPlus, Inc.
About.me

Co-Author, Performance Testing Guidance for Web Applications
Author, Web Load Testing for Dummies
Contributing Author, Beautiful Testing, and How To Reduce the Cost of Testing

"If you can see it in your mind...
     you will find it in your life."

From the Mailbox: Software Development: Art or Science?

Here’s a question that I didn’t realize I had much to say about until I read my own response.

 

The Question:

Software Development: Is it an art or a science? An age old question I know, but what do you think and why?

My Response:

From the Mailbox: What makes software "good" or "bad"?

I was asked the question below (lightly edited for anonymity, clarity, and length) today and found it intriguing, so I thought I'd post it here.

 

The Question:

This is an attempt to understand how (and why) users, practitioners, and professionals perceive the difference between a good software product and a bad software product, specifically released software products.

My Response: