STAREAST 2024 - Concurrent Session | TechWell

STAREAST 2024 - Concurrent Sessions

Concurrent sessions offer attendees the flexibility to explore a variety of topics throughout the conference on Wednesday and Thursday in order to customize their learning experience. Learn both enterprise foundations and new methodologies to grow your skills, supercharge your knowledge, and re-energize your career growth.

Wednesday, May 1

Kevin Pyles
O.C. Tanner
W1

An AI-Partnered Testing Future—It’s Here!

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 11:30am to 12:30pm

Let’s be real, we are quite a ways out from AI taking over the world. AI doomsday apologists stay home! On the other hand, AI is changing everything about software creation. In this presentation, Kevin Pyles will take you on a walk down memory lane through waterfall, agile and DevOps practices, and will then introduce you to the future of software creation known as AI-Partnered Development. Let’s get practical with real-world examples of AI assisting designers, solving coding challenges and testing software right next to human testers. We will explore how AI is also involved today in...

Northwestern Mutual
W2

Great Products Come from Engineering Teams Who Value Quality and User Empathy

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 11:30am to 12:30pm

Christina Thalayasingam often stumbles upon memes that show testers celebrating when they find a bug. Painting a picture that testers thrive on “proving developers wrong”. This is upsetting. The mindset that the quality of the product is owned by someone with a testing-specific role and user empathy is only something related to product and design, still prevails. She manages an engineering team and comes from a background that strongly values function and non-functional testing. However, she is a developer. Her team believes in quality and that there is no segregation on who owns the...

Perficient Inc
W3

API Testing Automation and CI/CD Integration

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 11:30am to 12:30pm

API Testing is a critical component of modern software development, ensuring the reliability and functionality of applications programing interfaces. However, integrating API testing into a robust CI/CD pipeline poses unique challenges with maintaining consistency and accuracy in test results across various environments and versions of the API. Changes in API endpoints, data formats, or authentication methods often result in test failures that will be difficult to trace and troubleshoot. To address these challenges, API versioning and automated API testing needs to be implemented. This...

Ashraya Iyer
BOK Financial
W4

The Dark Side of Agile Metrics: Unmasking Hidden Dangers

Preview
Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 11:30am to 12:30pm

In the ever-evolving landscape of agile software development, metrics have emerged as crucial navigational tools, guiding teams towards their goals. However, amid the brilliance of metrics lies a hidden, often misunderstood, and potentially perilous side. As we explore the uncharted side of metrics, we will unveil the misconceptions, pitfalls, and clandestine dangers lurking behind agile metrics. Delve into real-world scenarios where the relentless pursuit of vanity metrics led to the accrual of technical debt, an increase in defect density, and the demoralization of once-thriving...

W5

Enabling Reliable Test Automation Though Isolation: Mocking HTTP Services Using Mountebank

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 11:30am to 12:30pm

Have you ever found yourself at a time when you have no control over an internal or external service and while your automation was running it failed due to instability in that service? Well, to automate tests in a safe and reliable way, you need to have control of the environment. When not available, one option is to isolate your application by creating mocks of the services. In this talk, Júlio will go through a use case scenario using Mountebank (mbtest.org), an open-source tool that enables us to create HTTP mocks, to remove the dependencies related to an external HTTP service in order...

Chris Loder
Rogue Automator
W6

Automation Face-Off

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 11:30am to 12:30pm

What do you think about when you hear the words "test automation"? Are you considering developing your own tools to help you probe the product deeply, or will you apply a commercial tool for automated checking? Are you excited by new, powerful, enabling technologies, or do you worry that a robot will replace you? One thing is for sure: when we apply tools, we fundamentally change the context and the nature of the work we do.Our panelists are software testing experts who will discuss all this and more with you! Together, we'll probe what people mean by automation, the power that tools can...

melissa-daley
Orca Intelligence
W7

Empowering Robust Testing Frameworks: Leveraging AI-Generated Requirements for Unparalleled Quality Assurance

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

Join Melissa as she explores the fusion of AI and quality assurance in software development. Discover how AI-generated requirements can revolutionize testing strategies, enhancing application quality. She will cover AI's role in requirements generation, and you will learn how AI automates the creation of diverse use case scenarios, ensuring comprehensive coverage, including edge cases. She will discuss traceability and alignment to outline how AI-generated requirements establish a robust traceability matrix, verifying all aspects of software functionality. Additionally, the session will...

PwC LLP
Courtney Six
PwC LLP
W8

Brick by Brick: Constructing the Ultimate User Testing Team

Preview
Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

The testing profession assembles its own team of 'master testers' with technical, automation, performance, and security roles. However, placing the end user as the final building block in your testing team can unlock valuable insights about your product's design and usability, helping to transform it into a true masterpiece. Constraints like time, access to end users, or user testing experience often prevent organizations from tapping directly into the end user's perspectives. Join Kris and Courtney to learn how they created a specialized user testing team in a multinational...

julia-pottinger
QualityWorks Consulting Group
W9

Next Level API Automation: Testing the Boundaries

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

APIs are an essential part of an increasingly large number of applications that we use daily. APIs enable applications to exchange data and functionality easily and securely. As testers, we want to ensure that our APIs do not break and provide the expected functionality. In this workshop, Julia Pottinger will get you started with automating APIs, creating a checklist of things needed to automate an API, automating workflows and negative tests for your API as well as checking that your APIs handle errors appropriately, follow the specified schema, and don't reveal data that it shouldn’t or...

Technical Systems Integrators
W10

AgileWARE Test Automation for DoD Network Testing

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

Join Charles Reynolds as he walks you through the experience of delivering test automation to the DoD (DISA) to facilitate rapid deployment of new releases of software and firmware for networking devices used to provide DoD networks. Additionally, the goal was to provide rapid infrastructure deployment for tier 3 support engineering to address new issues as they arose. At one point the DoD was several revisions behind in deploying to the field allowing for significant vulnerabilities in our nation’s networks. See how AgileWARE (a custom Agile Workflow And Resource Enablement COTS tool) was...

Filip-Hric
Replay.io
W11

Test Like a Developer, Develop Like a Tester

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

Developers and testers seem to be pulling against each other sometimes and yet, both try to reach the same goal—great software. Their focus is on different parts of the development process, but there are actually quite a few things they can learn from each other! Filip will shed some light into how developers can apply a testing mindset in order to write better code and what can testers learn from developers to enhance their process. He will cover why it’s important that testers get a basic understanding of the app they are testing and why developers should care about flakiness. Learn...

Grafana k6
W12

Performance Assurance and SRE - Panel

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

Delivering performance applications is a multi-layered challenge these days. Teams must assure that the application performs on multiple fronts. Each new function must have quick responses and be as slim as possible from the coding moment. It must be quick and light for a single request, handle concurrency, and coexist with multiple other processes even in micro-serviced applications spread all over the place. Not to mention, it must handle lots of loads once in production. It must stay performant and available within the agreed thresholds. The impressive amount of tasks to tackle and co-...

Dmitriy Gumeniuk
EPAM Systems
W13

Unlocking the Future: Real-World Applications of 3 Open-Sourced ML Powered Tools for Test Automation

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 2:45pm to 3:45pm

In an era where Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing various industries, the field of test automation is no exception. This talk aims to shed light on how ML can be practically applied in test automation using open-source tools that are readily available for implementation. Join Dmitry as he explores three popular tools—Healenium, ReportPortal and Visual Regression Tracker—that leverage ML to offer innovative solutions in self-healing capabilities, testing results analysis and visual testing, respectively. You will learn about the rise of AI and ML in...

Platform Science
W14

Treating Your Test Tools like a Real Product

Preview
Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 2:45pm to 3:45pm

Have you ever had a QA tool fail to gain momentum? Ever had a splintered array of test automation frameworks that does the exact same thing across your quality engineering organization? Ever have a hard time getting leadership to sign off for tools that you know could easily boost testing productivity? If you answered yes to any of these, come join Albrecht in this crash course in building your quality engineering roadmap. In this session, Albrecht will go over how to build a product roadmap that aligns with your organization's goals and identify key milestones, to ensure your...

W15

Automated Mobile App Testing on Various Physical and Virtual Devices

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 2:45pm to 3:45pm

Many organizations face the issue today whereby their customers have a wide range of mobile devices upon which their application runs making it challenging to find all potential defects. To accomplish testing of various devices would require an organization to purchase many physical devices and maintain them. Join Alanzo as he walks you through how his team validated the functionality and compatibility of their mobile app in various environments and on various mobile devices through use of a robust test environment. He will outline how developing automated scripts, implementing a...

Quality Works Consulting Group LLC
W16

Agile Testing: Ensuring Quality in Fast-Paced Development Environments

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 2:45pm to 3:45pm

Speed and quality are not mutually exclusive. Agile testing is essential to ensuring software quality while allowing for quick iterations. How can you strike the right balance between maintaining high-quality software and meeting aggressive development timelines? In this session, you will learn how to navigate the dynamic landscape of agile testing and uncover strategies for maintaining software quality in high-velocity development settings. Explore the interplay between agile methodologies and testing practices, discovering how to seamlessly integrate quality assurance without...

Everfi, a Blackbaud company
W17

A Crash Course In Getting Started with Cypress

Preview
Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 2:45pm to 3:45pm

In 2024, the amount of new technologies and practical applications to software testing principles can leave any software tester looking to advance their career in test automation feeling overwhelmed. In this interactive session, Anna will share the applied learning models that she has developed over her 10+ years of experience in the field to empower you on your test automation learning journey. You will gain a deeper understanding of Cypress, a user-friendly framework, to help you write your first automated test, as well learn practical tips and tricks on how to further develop...

Melissa Benua
mParticle
Janna_Loeffler
mParticle
Adam_Auerbach
EPAM Systems
W18

Modern Test Automation Strategies - A Panel

Wednesday, May 1, 2024 - 2:45pm to 3:45pm

Love it or hate it, test automation drives a large part of our day-to-day lives as testers. But writing and maintaining software automation doesn't HAVE to be painful! Learn from a panel of automation experts - including Janna Loeffler, Adam Auerbach, and more - about how their teams have built reliable automation tooling and infrastructure that can stand the test of time. Moderated by Melissa Benua, the panel will answer YOUR questions and help you address the challenges that we all face when scaling our test automation to match modern continuous delivery needs. You don't have to...

Thursday, May 2

Tom-Stiehm
Coveros
T1

Prompt Engineering for Mere Mortals

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 9:45am to 10:45am

Prompt Engineering is a skill that anyone can develop, even mere mortals. While Generative AI can produce amazing results, it isn’t magic. You don’t need to be an AI Wizard to learn to craft effective prompts that help you leverage Generative AI in a way that helps you complete your tasks and achieve your goals and objectives. Tom will break down the terms and use everyday examples to illustrate Prompt Engineering best practices so that you can more easily navigate the nuances of Generative AI. In this session, you will learn what Prompt Engineering is and how to use it to get the best...

Auction Edge
T2

Small QA Team Survival Strategies

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 9:45am to 10:45am

Are you and your team having trouble managing your workload? Is your Dev to QA ratio completely out of whack? Do you need help convincing management that one or two extra hands would make a difference? Amanda will draw from her experience on teams of various sizes to provide examples of how to organize the QA workload into manageable pieces without losing your sanity. She will also give advice on how to outsource to other non-QA team members that can assist with getting stories to done and avoid potential bottlenecks. We’ll also discuss ways to get developer assistance with unit and...

T3

How Green Is Your Testing?

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 9:45am to 10:45am

The evolution of testing from manual to automated has created a stir around efficiency and savings. Today we are delivering the best products while exploring ways to save energy and money. At the enterprise level, delivery managers and executives are looking for ways to reduce their carbon footprint and save money in all areas of the DevOps lifecycle. As the world collaborates to meet the net zero carbon emissions by 2050, the DevOps team is at the center of sustainability. Sustainability is how we co-exist with the planet by making choices that will sustain the planet for generations...

TapHere! Technology
T4

Test-Driven Development in Agile/DevOps

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 9:45am to 10:45am

On agile teams, development moves quickly. This makes it especially easy to fall into the trap of initially ignoring the crucial component of testing. In order to add confidence to the product Stephanie's team outputs, they have modified their workflow to lean on Test-Driven Development. Test-Driven Development pushed Stephanie to be a better developer by: helping define her requirements in code, use tests as a guideline for completion, and easily incorporate automated testing into pipelines in her merge requests. Test-Driven Development has also enabled her team to be more effective by:...

Tariq King
Test IO
T6

AI in Testing: A Moderated Panel Discussion

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 9:45am to 10:45am

Artificial intelligence is the newest trend in software testing. But what is it, and how will it impact the tester's role, both today and in the future? What do you need to do to embrace this emerging technology? Tariq King will moderate this panel discussion to give you an opportunity to hear the opinions of industry leaders about AI in testing. You will have a chance to drive the debate, so come prepared with all your AI questions.

Curiosity Software
T7

Adversarial Testing for AIs: Get Ready to Fuzz Things Up!

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 11:15am to 12:15pm

With the “AI Boom”, testing AI will be a vital skill for every tester. But, how can you test a system with few expected results or test oracles? This talk will discuss the vital skills that Quality Engineers offer to AI/ML development as well as different tools and techniques that you can use to start testing AI. Ben will discuss how you can automate “Adversarial Testing”, a technique which provides inputs to see if an AI produces undesirable responses. You will learn a technique known as “Fuzzing”, in which testing provides an array of inputs to see if a program produces a result that is...

Teaching Strategies
T8

Was I Supposed to Use a Teaspoon or a Tablespoon? Creating Your Leadership Recipe

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 11:15am to 12:15pm

Wouldn't it be great if leadership was an easy recipe with clear and concise instructions? 1-part hard work, 1-part knowledge, a dash of self-confidence, sprinkle with humility and grace, and bake for the duration of your career. Perfection! Unfortunately, leadership is a complex recipe, and the measurements can be extremely tricky to get right. Even worse, if the ingredients in your recipe are slightly altered, it might seem like the recipe wasn't a success. But cooking is an artistic endeavor; recipes can be adapted and so can your leadership journey. Join Christine as she helps you...

Lockheed Martin
Lisa Allman
Lockheed Martin
T10

DevOps and Airplanes: A Match Made in the Clouds

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 11:15am to 12:15pm

DevOps principles can be applied to various industries, including aviation, to enhance the development, testing, and deployment of software systems used in aircraft. These software systems are critical for various functions such as navigation, communication, and monitoring. It's important to note that the aviation industry has unique safety and regulatory requirements that do not to apply to commercial products, so DevOps practices must align with these standards to ensure the safety and reliability of aircraft software systems. Join Aly and Lisa as they take off and discuss how DevOps...

T11

Integration Testing with Cypress

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 11:15am to 12:15pm

Running tests on a live environment (as opposed to a mocked one) is generally an anti-pattern within the Cypress community. You won’t find many (if any!) articles explaining how to do so, or how to do so successfully. However, live app testing can sometimes be critical when it comes to integration testing; as it helps you find bugs your mocked tests just won’t find. These bugs are usually critical and can make or break your production deployments. Stephanie McSwain has seen it work first hand and it’s been eye opening. Join this session and Stephanie will show you how, when, and why to...

Slalom, Inc.
T12

Managing Test Data in Enterprise Environments

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 11:15am to 12:15pm

Managing test data is hard. Managing test data in complex, distributed, poorly documented, and organization-spanning enterprise software is substantially harder. In enterprise systems test data is convoluted, hidden, and hard to synthesize, the test environments it flows through are shared and unstable, and the test scenarios dependent on it are long and complex. These challenges combine to cripple many test automation efforts in enterprise software. In this talk Blake Norrish will describe what an optimal test data management strategy looks like, how the nature of enterprise software...

Appdome
T13

Streamline Cloud Testing of Cybersecurity Features in Mobile Apps

Preview
Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

In CI/CD pipelines, automated testing services validate functionality of apps across hundreds of real-world mobile devices and OS versions. However, automated testing services can also leverage methods and tools that violate cybersecurity policies or that cybersecurity professionals find problematic and dangerous including: emulators, virtualization, resigning, debugging, dual spaces, Magisk and more. Once protections are added to a mobile app, security features detect these methods and tools and the resulting cyber defense may prevent testers from using parts of these testing...

Iterable
T14

Navigating the Testing Career Labyrinth: From Intern to Director

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

Navigating a successful career in software testing presents formidable challenges, especially when striving to climb the career ladder. Whether you're aiming to transition from manual testing to becoming an SDET or contemplating roles in people management and organizational leadership, forging your path can feel overwhelming. Join Jeff Sing, as he draws upon his personal journey, starting as a QA Intern and progressing to his current role as a Director of Engineering. Through anecdotes and insights, you will learn the strategies and decisions that can significantly propel your career...

T15

Let’s Get Serious About Testing

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

You want to go faster, your business wants to go faster, frankly the market is forcing you to go faster. Your organization has no choice, you go faster or you get left behind! All that speed cannot come at the expense of quality though, you must maintain or improve quality as you increase velocity. If you are going to speed up to meet demand and maintain quality, you need to automate testing. To automate you need a solid plan and architecture. Join Tony to explore unit, functional and regression testing—why each one is needed and where to implement. Understand the differences between...

Lisette Zounon
Zsquare Solutions Inc.
T16

Enabling a DevOps Culture with Embedded Systems

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

In today's technology-driven landscape, where software and hardware intertwine seamlessly in embedded systems, adopting a DevOps culture becomes imperative. This talk delves into the dynamic world of embedded systems and explores how organizations can successfully implement and nurture a DevOps culture within this unique domain. DevOps, with its emphasis on collaboration, automation, and continuous improvement, has revolutionized software development. Our discussion will navigate through these challenges and unveil strategies to harness the full potential of DevOps in the embedded systems...

Deepika Kale
Guardant Health
T17

Kafka and Kafka Testing: Streamlining Real-time Data Processing

Preview
Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

In today's data-driven landscape, real-time data processing is the backbone of modern applications. Kafka, a distributed event streaming platform, has emerged as a critical component in building data-intensive systems. This presentation provides an in-depth exploration of Kafka and the essential practice of Kafka testing, offering attendees valuable insights into harnessing the power of real-time data streams while ensuring robust system reliability. You will be introduced to Kafka and to understanding Kafka's architecture and core components, as well as the importance of Kafka...

Grigori Trofimov
Parasoft
T18

Stressed About Performance Testing? Simulate It!

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 1:30pm to 2:30pm

Preparing your software application to handle peak loads and high-volume conditions is vital, whether your business is seasonal operations like e-commerce during holiday seasons, a ticketing system for big events, a live streaming service hosting the World Cup, or a financial institute that must provide seamless transactions. Load and performance testing, along with the creation of a simulated environment for testing, is your key to success. This combination provides the understanding of how your application will behave under high-stress circumstances and ensures stability and performance...

Vijay Lathia
Bose Corporation
T19

Elevating Software Quality: Strategies for Qualifying Products Used by Millions

Preview
Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 3:00pm to 4:00pm

In the dynamic world of software development, guaranteeing top-tier product quality for a broad user base is a formidable challenge. This talk confronts this challenge head-on with a strategy to enhance software quality. Vijay will cover how to decode Minimum Viable Product (MVP) requirements, forming the bedrock of your testing strategy. Then learn how to prioritize test plan coverage aligned with these requirements for precise testing. Ensure you smoothly onboard new QA team members with a comprehensive "Quick Start Guide." This accelerates their contributions to quality assurance...

Dorothea Bozicolona-Volpe
Social Espionage
T20

How To Become A QA Influencer—6 Steps Toward Building A Stronger Digital You!

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 3:00pm to 4:00pm

Today IT leadership & QA executives of the world’s top brands all have strong, significant & differentiating personal brands to differentiate them in their industry. Whether you are an associate, executive, sales person, business leader, or human resources professional in an organization, who you are matters as much as how you communicate it. Now more than ever it is important to get your voice heard and establish your reputation on and off line. Learn the tips and tricks for building your personal brand from the expert that taught several IT & C-Suite executives, business...

Insider Intelligence
T21

Crafting Excellence: Optimizing Test Case Design with Domain Analysis

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 3:00pm to 4:00pm

In today's fast-paced software development landscape, the pressure to deliver code rapidly is unrelenting. However, this doesn't mean that our applications are becoming simpler or that testing is less critical. On the contrary, the software environment has grown more diverse, and applications are constructed in increasingly intricate ways to meet evolving business demands. In this session, we draw inspiration from the craftsmanship of master swordsmiths who meticulously forged swords to perfection. Quality, in their world, meant the difference between life and death. Similarly, in software...

Discover Financial Services
T22

From Raw Data to Actionable Insights: Mastering Testing Metrics for Effective Decision Making

Preview
Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 3:00pm to 4:00pm

In today's rapidly evolving engineering landscape, metrics play a crucial role in assessing performance, making data-driven decisions, and driving successful project outcomes. Engineers who can effectively create, interpret, and present impactful data metrics have a distinct advantage in driving innovation and driving organizational success. This presentation dives deep into the essential skills and techniques necessary for engineers to excel in the realm of testing metrics. Join Cholette to delve into the different types of testing metrics. Explore how engineers can set clear...

Testlio
T23

Embracing Accessibility: Adapting to the Human Side of WCAG 2.2 Testing

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 3:00pm to 4:00pm

The slow adoption of accessibility guidelines, particularly Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2, remains a consistent challenge within the software development community. Companies often struggled to integrate accessibility into their DevOps cycles, as compliance necessitated substantial changes in development practices and KPIs. Many auditors tend to test websites reactively, hindering the evolution of understanding and accessibility testing techniques. Recognizing that viewing accessibility guidelines as a growth opportunity can lead to improved products and happier...

Speedscale
T24

Fundamentals of Kubernetes Performance Testing

Thursday, May 2, 2024 - 3:00pm to 4:00pm

Migrating an existing application to a Kubernetes-based service architecture introduces an entirely new set of performance testing challenges that demand careful consideration. In this presentation, join Matthew to identify issues encountered with performance testing apps as they migrate from existing architectures onto cloud-native and Kubernetes. The session will explore: 1) The delicate balance between performance and correctness when dealing with applications at "internet" scale. 2) The unexpected impact of the Kubernetes auto-scaler and how it can influence the behavior of your...