Part 1: Meeting with the Dev/Test Lab Administrator - Read here before starting Part 2 below.
Part 2: Meeting the Dev and Test Engineers
Abbie’s Dev/Test Lab
(Ziva, Test Lead and Tony, Dev Lead walk into the lab)
Ziva – Shut up Tony. That bug was not because of a setup issue. I know it was a REAL bug.
Tony – Ho Ho…I never said it wasn’t a bug Lady…All I am asking of you is to reproduce it.
Ziva – Hmmm…I am going to do just that Mr. Developer. Just wait till we discuss with Abbie. Abbie, could you re-setup the test bed you gave me yesterday. I need to kick Tony’s butt with that stupid bug.
Tony – Alright Miss. Perfect. How many times have you raised defects only to find that the s/w config was not setup correctly, the Environment variable was not set properly, the right version of the required s/w was not installed blah blah blah…
Abbie – Guys Guys…STOP….Agent Pal could you help us here before these guys eat up each other
Agent Pal – Ha ha…no problem guys…I have the right solution…Ziva, would you love it if you could capture the test bed right when the bug happens and push it out to Tony…File a defect with the link to the bug reproduced???
Ziva – Are you serious?? Can we do that?
Agent Pal – Yup…and you can also record all the user actions while the bug happens as a movie and let Tony watch it!!!
Ziva – Wow…That is unbelievable…That is going to save me weeks of testing cycles. How many times have I had to re-create bugs only bcoz the stubborn dev couldn’t reproduce it and wouldn’t accept the defect..
Agent Pal – Totally agree….And you also automate all the manual steps involved in setting up the test bed…prevents any manual errors…
Ziva – You are just awesome Pal (Gives Pal a big hug). Abbie – when are we getting this LabManager in our lab. I am going to tell my Boss that we can complete the whole testing cycle in 30 days – instead of 50 days. Am sure to get a fat pay hike and a promotion this year
Tony – Mr. Pal, once you can stop blushing, and recover from that hug from Ziva, could I ask you a favour?
Agent Pal – Sure, shoot it Tony
Tony – Well my team designs and develops some large distributed systems that run the company’s online e-commerce portal. And I would like to create some of these N-Tier systems in the lab, today it takes me days to get the networks setup, VMs configured and have the system up. Anyway that your solution could speed up this process.
Agent Pal – Of course yes. You can use LabManager to design and deploy some of these complex multi tier applications.
Tony – I don’t want to tussle with the networking folks to setup the network and then beg abbie to give me the VM resources. Can that be done.
Agent Pal – Why not. It is as simple as defining the VM roles, network settings etc. in LabManager and just hit deploy. LabManager automatically brings up the whole system – and it can be an exact replica of your production application.
Tony – Wow that sounds cool. If it is going to be really that SIMPLE, I am going to give you a big hug too.
Agent Pal – Oops…I guess just a hand shake will do.
Tony – Hmmm..Okay.
(Michele, Marketing dept walks into the lab)
Michele - Abbie, I had requested for a Wiki Server to run our new marketing campaign – is it ready. We need to go live next week?
Abbie – You need to give me more time Michele. You wanted the Wiki to be accessible over the internet. That has to get cleared by the Networking and the Security Folks. Will let you know when it is done.
(Michele walks away)
Agent Pal – You should probably let her self-provision pre-built secure Wiki servers using the Citrix Self Service Portal.
Abbie – Ha ha…None of your solutions are gonna work here Pal That lady is just DUMB …Nevermind she will never be able to do that.
Agent Pal – Oh …The Self Service Portal servers just that purpose. A Super Simple UI where even the most Non-Tech folks can get what they want. You should try that with Michele.
Abbie – Will do Pal. And I want to charge these folks for the VMs that they run. So they learn to use the resources scarcely.
Agent Pal – Definitely. You should look at the billing code functionality built into Self Service Portal. Lets you generate monthly reports on how much resources your users have consumed.
Abbie – Ya…that will be handy. Btw you should meet McGee, the Geek who manages our Production Infrastructure. Your solution has been wonderful and I am sure McGee could use your help too.
Part 3 – Meeting with the Production Infrastructure Administrator
To be Continued….
Note: All characters depicted above are purely fictitious and bear no resemblance to anyone alive or dead – however any similarity to the fictitious characters of NCIS is purely intentional.
This blog is my personal and all the contents here are my personal comments and have no bearing on my employer.
