Testing 1 2 3

Boss is out this week but he had given me three test cases to look at and send step-by-steps to the automation team. The first one hit a snag because the specs had changed since the case was written, in a way which changed it from a simple 6 steps to a more complex 9. And then it hit a dead end when it failed, and the person who is the expert (I needed a verification) was not available for the rest of the day.

Somewhere in there I went to Togo's for lunch and drew a trainee, whose trainer hit a dead end when she looked up at the back of the chips rack to find that the cheat sheet was missing which tells them what goes into each kind of sandwich. She sent someone to fix that, but meanwhile took over making the sandwich, and even though I said, and she repeated that it was for here, she made it to go. And she forgot the mustard. FAIL.

Since I was at a full stop, I ducked out a little early to pick up two packages at UPS and then went to Toyota for their new owners' celebration. A festival of miscommunication. The info desk woman said it was in the next building, across two parking lots. Nope. Another receptionist came out and directed us to the first building, upstairs. The only signage was right in front of the room. Nice training room, and they had warm sodas and three types of sandwiches and cookies. I had a late lunch and a snack just before, so I didn't have anything.

There was a slide show, with some videos played from the fleet sales manager's laptop. Kind of small, but good enough. He went through a lot of the features of Toyota cars, and since almost everyone in there bought a Prius he went into a lot of detail on the in-dash system and some other hybrid stuff. One revelation: the Prius battery fully charged is only good for about an hour/20 miles, making it "the world's most expensive golf cart". There was a handout which had a spreadsheet showing $$ per x miles at $/gal at xMPG, designed for nobody to actually read. I had done this spreadsheet but only at $5/gal before I decided on the Corolla. The Prius only saves about $3k in gas over 5 years but costs $10k more.

There were about 30 people there, and of course the rude and inconsiderate parents with the very vocal toddler sat right behind me, after it was too late to change seats. What should have been a 30-minute presentation went 90 because half the class had a bevy of inane questions, comments and nonsequiters they needed to blurt out. Okay, so they all raised their hands first.

I put a crimp in his presentation when he wanted to show the fancy electronic-coded key which the Corolla comes with, but I had already gutted it so my after-market alarm's dongle would work correctly. I tried to warn him, but I guess rental salespeople never see after-market stuff on their vehicles.

The best part was I was able to connect with the person responsible for getting me the refund for the botched backup camera install, she said they would have a check for me tomorrow. And their head of customer relations was there, and as I suspected nobody had clued her in to the license plate debacle, she promised to look into it and call me tomorrow. It's possible, she said, that the plates had been returned to the DMV (but then the DMV would have notified me. no?).

I did learn some interesting things about ABS brakes and some Federally-mandated-as-of-2013 safety features which are in my car.

The two packages were a box of ink cartridges for the wireless inkjet and a replacement for the munged cargo holder, in a big but light box. I emptied the one in the trunk, threw it away along with the boxes, and tried to assemble the new on in the trunk, but it just wasn't bright enough so I took it inside, and I wasn't bright enough. It's on the livingroom floor 3/4 assembled but that last 1/4 is a bad word.

Dinner, reheated the brisket from last night and a croissant, but that wasn't enough so I heated up about 8 pieces of pre-cooked bacon. And then bananas and ice cream for dessert.

All of that while replaying the after-birth edition of The Bachelorette, which ended with them announcing the next bachelor. This guy was one of the loser contestants, apparently, he is very handsome and though he's American he grew up in South America and has that accent. Semi-pro soccer player. The WTF moment was when he showed pictures of his baby girl. He got his girlfriend pregnant but it "didn't work out". Sounds like he dumped her, and is happy she got custody. Bastardo.

Last weekend in the city reminded me how much I like the little neighborhood at the end of the Ocean Beach line. I have to go back there, but need a weekend day when the marine layer is out to sea. Also, one of my FB friends in Moro Bay says the humpback whales are running, close enough to shore to see from the beach. Maybe weekend after next I'll drive down there.

Plans for tomorrow:
Work
Maybe hang out at Starbucks

Over the Hump

Up late again. Every time I have some event at night I push bedtime that much later. Woke up at 9:30,  totally surprised me. Got to work an hour later, still stumped by the issue from the day before. Finally got the Expert to go over the bug with me, decided it was a new bug.

Usually when we find something this blatant, we install the previous build to see if it was there then. The test case docs indicated it was working in a build three months ago, so I fired that one up - and it did not work correctly. The tester only checked to see that the right error messages displayed, he did not check that the feature actually worked correctly. So I went back about a year, and it still failed.

Something this important doesn't usually make it through so many tests unnoticed, so I emailed engineering with the "is it a bug or a feature?" question. They are looking into it. May not have an answer till next week, what with vacations.

So I went on to the next one on my list, and got that written up in a format which automation can turn into a test suite. One test case is really about 40 tests this time.

Home, sausages, corn & sauerkraut for dinner. Took out the garbage, and then put the tall wastebasket into which I had been dumping the cat poo, wheeled it out to the dumpster and unloaded. It was all in a big black trash bag, tied up, so no worries. While I ate I watched HLN's play by play of the trial where this redneck who killed his stepson and blamed his biological son, is trying to get his son off the hook by saying he lied when he blamed his son. To me it looked like they did it together.

Managed to assemble the cargo holder. The instructions did not point out that the netting had an up side and a down side. Once I figured that out, and realized there was a much neater way than theirs to set the tension strap, it only took a couple of minutes.

Domino parked herself on the couch for the first time in months, and let me cut off a lot of her mats. But when I started getting near the worst ones she made rude noises and got ready to be elsewhere, so I left it at that. She has very fine undercoat fur, and it gets tangled easily.

The "World's Best Cat Litter" turns out to be the worst for the machines - it doesn't clump neatly, and it seems to intensify the urine smell. I had to vacuum the area all around the machines because it spills out the sides. Back to Arm & Hammer, but I need to make sure I get the right type.

One of my photog friends is now editor in chief of an online photo magazine, NSW stuff, but not pron. I subscribed and looked at the first issue (which someone else edited) and the last two (which he did) and have to say his is a vast improvement. But we differ a lot on what we like to shoot and look at, he's a lot more hardcore than I am, and is more into what they call Fashion™ - models wearing tons of makeup, or ludicrous wigs, or lots of bling. But out of the two issues of his I looked at, there were only a couple of pieces I would have sent pink slips to.

Toyota failed me again. No contact from the customer relations person. I emailed her at 9:55 pm and she answered 10 minutes later that her child was injured at school. I suppose I believe her, but doubt if that took up so much time that she couldn't have texted me sometime today.

Also, I phoned to find out if the business office had my check, but they transferred me to the used car office and it went to voicemail. I didn't have time to go there today, anyway.

Plans for tomorrow:
Work
Manicure
Toyota
YOTB