Dateline: Maastricht, Monday November 2, 2015
I’ve just finished watching an excellent Dutch TV drama series titled (in English) Hollands Hope. It encapsulates much of what I’ve come to admire about the Dutch way of life – freedom of ideals and creative expression. My initial introduction to the Netherlands also encapsulated these traits, but in the guise of “total football” through Cruyff, Neeskens, Gullit, Bergkamp and latterly van Basten. So, my approach to the next few days will be heavily influenced by these Dutch ideals and therefore I’ve come up with the concept of Total Blogging or Totaal Bjogging, as I will refer to it from now on.
This years’ EuroSTAR conference is a bit different for me. I’m not here as a speaker or a delegate, I’m here as a Bjogger. I’m here representing the lovely people from the TESTHuddle – a EuroSTAR community initiative. Not something I was planning just a few short weeks ago, but an unexpected opportunity to be grabbed by the balls and run with at full tilt. Mostly I write to amuse myself and not for a particular audience, but for the next 3 days discipline must be the order of each day with deadlines met and goals achieved.
My commitment to the TESTHuddle community is to submit my Bjog posts for publication by 6:30 each evening, while my primary personal goal is to score as many free t-shirts on my EuroSTAR 2015 journey as my luggage allowance back to Oz will permit.
This is the first of three daily previews that will be book-ended by three end of day round-ups. In essence, each evening around 6:30 I’ll tell you what I’m planning for the following day and then, once that day is done, I’ll let you know how the day actually panned out. It’s really no different from what I’ve been doing for half my working life – presenting a high-level daily plan and following it up with a more detailed outcome analysis of what actually happened. As we know, it is rare that ANY day turns out the way we planned it, so the variances will get more coverage than the expected outcomes and triage will play an important role in minimising any damage I may inadvertently (but inevitably) have caused 🙂
Day 1 is always chaotic, as I find my bearings, seek out old friends and dodge those who will be nice to my face but think I’m a jerk – one of life’s joys when you get to my age. At EuroSTAR, Day 1 is always a half day, it’s an easing into the conference proper, after a day and a half of tutorials and workshops. It sets the tone and builds some momentum for the next couple of days. For me the biggest challenge is always to get to each presentation on time, as I seem incapable of finishing coffees or conversations in the allotted timeframe.
Here’s my Day 1 Plan of action…..
13:30 Ruud’s Awakening (or Opening Remarks)
13:45 TRENDZ 2030 from Richard van Hooijdonk (Keynote 1)
14:30 Coffee Break 1 and a visit to the EXPO
15:00 Transforming Business Users in Test Drivers (Track T2), Claire Goss
16:00 Mobile Testing, One Step Forward or Two Steps Back (Track T5), Susan van der Ven
17:00 Kanban Testing and Lego from Kristoffer Nordström (Keynote 2)
Goedenavond Maastricht
About Colin
Colin is this year’s community Reporter winner. He is a former software developer, now software tester. He currently lives in Melbourne, Australia and provides consulting services through his own company. He has been writing his “iTesting” Blog for over 3 years and has a presence on Twitter as “ColintheTester”. Colin has been a EuroSTAR presenter on three occasions and has also spoken at dozens of other conferences around the world.
Colin will be providing daily updates on the TEST Huddle blog throughout the conference.
