I’ve been hinting about a new venture on Twitter, and it’s time to explain what’s going on.

I’m in the process of opening a new office. Or rather, my company, Quality Tree Software, Inc. is opening a new space in our current building in Pleasanton, CA.

It’s 1200 square feet of open-layout-Agile-goodness. When it’s done, it will be outfitted in the spirit of the best Agile organizations I’ve seen. It will be one big wide open workspace with lots of natural light. We’ll fill it with modular furniture that will be able to accommodate a variety of uses.

The space is still under construction. So you’ll have to use your imagination to envision the finished space. But trust me. It will be cool. It will look like a well-appointed team room. There will be big whiteboards. There will be a big visible CI monitor. There will be a library. There will be a story wall. There will be big visible charts. There will be desks suitable for pairing. There will be comfy chairs. There will be index cards.

My intent is to create a training space that offers participants an immersive Agile experience. Just as I’ve recommended that people visit Pivotal Labs in San Francisco or Atomic Object in Grand Rapids or Menlo Innovations in Ann Arbor, I hope that others will be inspired to recommend that their friends and colleagues visit our new space to see what an Agile space feels like.

And because having this space means we have our very own dedicated venue, we’ll be able to offer beta-level, not-quite-ready-for-primetime classes at significantly reduced rates. And we’ll be able to experiment freely.

I’m already talking with other training providers about classes they might want to do in the space. Our intent is to host offerings from all sorts of folks. It’s kinda like having a performance venue showcasing awesome trainers and facilitators who are aligned with our values.

In that spirit, the vision is to create far more than “just” a great training space. I also hope that the space can become a kind of community hub. I want it to become the kind of place that people look forward to visiting just, well, because. Because it feels good to be there. Because it reminds them of what a living breathing team space feels like. So we plan to host community events like OSTATLI in the space. And I hope that the space will foster a community of practice for Agile trainers where we can share experiences and material, and collaborate to create better classes.

There’s still a lot more work to be done before we’re ready for visitors. We’re currently targeting an October opening. But construction delays could push that date back. I’ll post updates here, and pictures, as things progress.

In the meantime, I hope you’ll consider visiting us when the space is finished!

Shameless plug alert!

Dale Emery and I are offering the 3-day Agile Testing Series of classes in Pleasanton, CA on April 22 – 24, 2009, and in Portland, OR on April 28 – 30, 2009.

We’ve structured the three days as a la carte offerings. You can take one, two, or all three days.

• Day 1 is “Adapting to Agile,” also known as The WordCount Simulation.
• Day 2 is “Acceptance Test Driven Development (ATDD) in Practice”
• Day 3 is “Exploratory Testing in an Agile Context”

We have discounted pricing right now: early bird pricing is just $499/day instead of the usual $599. In addition, if you register 2 or more people for the same class simultaneously, you can take advantage of our 20% group discount. And we’re offering a “Buy 3 get 1 free” Guest Pass offer where if you buy the whole series, you’ll get a Guest Pass to give to a friend or colleague so they can join in the fun (some restrictions apply, see terms and conditions for details).

And if that’s not enough, I’ve created a limited coupon offer for my blog readers. The first 5 people who register for each class using the coupon code “testobsessed” will receive an extra 10% discount on the class fee.

So it’s the start of a new year, and as part of my strategic plan for 2009 I’m picking up where I left off with my experiments in virtual training.

I’m not ready to offer virtual training commercially just yet. But I am getting closer. I’m still figuring out packaging and pricing. And I’m still thinking about additional value-added materials and exercises that would make my virtual offerings much richer.

In the meantime I need more feedback to be sure I’m headed in the right direction. And since I’m Test Obsessed, that means more testing.

That’s where you come in.

Interested in getting free virtual training in exchange for brutally honest feedback and (if earned) a testimonial? I’d like to talk to you. In particular, I am looking for early feedback from people who:

• Are individual contributors, leads, or managers actively working on software projects.
• Have attended at least one instructor-led software development or testing related class in the last 5 years.
• Work in an organization that supports staff members participating in training and/or conferences.
• Are in a position to judge whether or not your organization would consider paying for this kind of training. (Note that I am not going to try to sell you anything; this is not a thinly veiled sales tactic. However, I need honest feedback about the commercial viability of what I have in mind from people who have real insight into current spending decision criteria around training and classes within their organizations.)
• Are interested in one of the following topics: Acceptance Test Driven Development (ATDD); Agile Testing; and/or Test Design/Analysis Techniques (such as all-pairs, state models, etc.).
• Are willing to invest time and effort to help me figure out what I need to do to make my virtual training totally rock.

To participate in my virtual training you will need access to a relatively recent PC or Mac with highspeed internet access, a microphone + headphones or a headset, and a web cam. (Linux *might* work and I am happy to experiment with folks if they have patience.)

Interested? Please send me an email. I’ll respond with a set of questions designed to get to know more about you, including questions about times and topics that would fit for you. I plan to hold these test sessions over the next couple of weeks.

And now for a blatant commercial announcement: I’m hosting a public offering of my Agile Testing class with Dale Emery on December 10 and 11 in Pleasanton, CA.

I predict that this is going to be a great class.

First, it features my WordCount simulation, and that’s always fun. I’ve run that simulation over 100 times and I learn something new every time. If you’re looking for a way to get people in your organization to understand, viscerally, why silos and Agile do not mix, this simulation is the best way I’ve discovered so far. It’s also a great way to see the impact that an integrated value-focused test effort that yields fast, visible feedback can have on Agility. (Note to self: I should blog more about lessons I’ve learned from that simulation.)

Second, the class features my Acceptance Test Driven Development (ATDD) demo. ATDD is a powerful way to involve testers early and make testing part of the definition of “Done.” And it’s also a powerful way to integrate test automation efforts into the development cycle instead of succumbing to test-last automation.

Third, Dale will be there. Dale and I make a great team.

When I ran a 1-day variation of this class at the STAREast and STARWest conferences as the “Adapting to Agile” tutorial, it sold out. I am (of course) hoping that this class will do the same.

I have had some people ask if I will hold future public offerings of this class, or other classes. The answer is yes – but only if I can fill this class. So if you want to see me offer more public classes, please come to this class and/or pass on the word to your friends and colleagues. Please help me fill this class…

This year, I’ve attended two small Open Space conferences, AONW and CITCON in Dallas. Both were incredibly valuable events. I learned a lot, I got to participate in some great conversations, and I met a variety of people with whom I’ve continued to connect.

(And some of those reconnections have been pleasantly serendipitous. While in Finland, I arrived about an hour early for one of my meetings. The only other person there was a fellow American. We started chatting and realized that we’d actually met before. In Dallas at CITCON. It’s a very, very small world, and getting smaller every day. But I digress.)

So anyway: there’s another, similar conference coming up October 22 – 23 here in the San Francisco Bay Area: the Agile Open California conference. Modeled after Agile Open Northwest, AOCA is another all-Open-Space-all-the-time-conference.

If you’ve experienced Open Space before, you know how cool it is. If you haven’t, you may not know how it works. In Open Space, the content is developed by the participants in the moment. It’s not your typical simultaneous-tracks-with-droning-speakers-and-death-by-PowerPoint conference. Instead, the content reflects what the participants want to talk about, now.

In traditional conferences, participant feedback inevitably includes comments like “The coffee breaks were the best part!” and “I found it incredibly valuable to be able to exchange ideas and experiences with my peers!” Open Space is like all-coffee-breaks-all-the-time, but with a lightweight organizing mechanism to make it easier to find the most relevant discussions for your current situation. The result is magic.

AOCA has an impressive participants list, and I’m sure the sessions and the conversations will be fascinating.

My friend Ainsley who has had a big hand in organizing AOCA tells me they still have places left. Frankly, I’m stunned that they aren’t sold out. I highly recommend you grab a space if you plan to be anywhere near SF at the end of October. Given my experiences at AONW and CITCON, I predict it will be among the best 2 days and $250 you’ve spent on conferences, ever.

(And in case you’re wondering – the only reason I’m not going is because I had a previous commitment that’s taking me out of the country – again. I’m really disappointed that I’m going to miss AOCA, but I can’t move my commitment. But because I think conferences like this are important, my company is a sponsor even though I can’t be there.)

Some time ago, I wrote about how Jennitta Andrea (among others) fired my imagination about what could be possible with advances in functional test automation tools.

I’m delighted to announce that Jennitta is heading up the Agile Alliance Functional Testing Tools program. With her boundless energy and contagious enthusiasm Jennitta recruited Ron Jeffries and me to serve on the committee and obtained funding from the Agile Alliance for the program.

The project we’re working on first is a visioning workshop where we hope to bring together folks who have been working on advancing the state of the art of functional testing tools to pool ideas, share experiences, imagine the future, and build community.

Here’s the official call for participation:

Agile Alliance Functional Testing Tools Visioning Workshop
Call for Participation

Dates: October 11 – 12, 2007
Times: 8 AM – 5 PM
Location: Portland, Oregon
Venue: Kennedy School

Description
The primary purpose of this workshop is to discuss cutting-edge advancements in and envision possibilities for the future of automated functional testing tools.

This is a small, peer-driven, invitation-only conference in the tradition of LAWST, AWTA, and the like. The content comes from the participants, and we expect all participants to take an active role. We’re seeking participants who have interest and experience in creating and/or using automated functional testing tools/frameworks on Agile projects.

This workshop is sponsored by the Agile Alliance Functional Testing Tools Program. The mission of this program is to advance the state of the art of automated functional testing tools used by Agile teams to automate customer-facing tests.

There is no cost to participate. Participants will be responsible for their own travel expenses. (However, we do have limited grant money available to be used at the discretion of the organizers to subsidize travel expenses. If you would like to be considered for a travel grant, please include your request, including amount needed, in your Request for Invitation.)

Requesting an Invitation
If you’re interested in being invited to participate in this workshop, please send an email to ” testtoolworkshop@agilealliance.org” answering the following questions:

1. What is your experience using functional tests as a way to specify functional requirements?
2. What is your experience with automated functional testing tools on Agile projects?
3. What do you hope to contribute to the workshop? Do you have any code or examples that you’d like to share? (Please note that you should not share anything covered by a non-disclosure agreement.)
4. What do you hope to get out of the workshop?

Invitations will be issued by September 1, 2007 so that we can confirm hotel room requirements. Please send in your request as soon as possible, before the workshop fills up.

Pass This Along
If you know of someone that would be a candidate for this workshop, please forward this call for participation on to them.

Additional Background
Automated functional testing is an integral and essential part of Agile development. Many Agile teams use functional tests to codify the system requirements. Some also practice Acceptance Test Driven Development.

Agile teams have particular needs for automated tools that are not well served by traditional record-and-playback GUI drivers. As requirements specifications, functional tests must be readable: clear, succinct, and expressed in the language of the business domain. As an automated safety net, the tests must be maintainable: built with reusable domain specific testing language components, easy to change as the requirements change.

The good news is that tool support for automated functional tests has grown significantly in recent years. There is a large variety of commercial and open source testing tools/frameworks available that support Agile development practices. The FIT framework was a significant boost to the state of the art of automated functional testing, both in terms of the syntax of the specification (tables), the detailed test execution feedback (cell by cell), and the development/execution environment (desktop tools rather than development or specialized tools).

However, we believe that it’s time for another significant boost to the state of the art.

• We are lacking integrated development environments that facilitate things like: refactoring test elements, command completion, incremental syntax validation (based on the domain specific test language), keyboard navigation into the supporting framework code, debugging, etc.
• We need more expressive test specification languages, possibly integrating executable: text, tables, shapes, and colors together into a single test.
• We need specification languages that can describe user interaction in a readable and maintainable fashion.
• We need to be able to view/navigate the tests in multiple different ways in order to see how the pieces of the puzzle contribute to
  the bigger picture of the domain/feature: organize tests based on their domain context; search for tests based on user-defined keywords (cross cutting concerns).
• … and things that we haven’t even thought of that will take us out of the current box, and into a new level of effectiveness ….

The Agile Alliance Functional Testing Tools Program seeks to advance the state of the art by creating opportunities for people who are in a position to advance the state of the art to share information and ideas, and explore possibilities.

I’ve been on the road and over-dosing on work lately, so this last holiday weekend I took a rare break from my email.  Three blissful days of connecting with humans (mostly family) in realspace.

Turns out, the spammers did not follow my lead.  They’ve been extremely active.  And once again, one or more of them used qualitytree.com in the return address (e.g. “randomaddresshere@qualitytree.com”).  The result: as we speak, my email client is pulling down thousands of bounce messages to the tune of 37Mb worth of “I’m sorry to have to inform you that your message could not be delivered to one or more recipients.”

My email client thinks it will be done in 3 hours.  It will then take me quite a while longer to dig out of the mess.  Yuck.  And that means that if you are waiting on email from me, it will be a while.

This also means that I need to spend some time figuring out a better email management strategy.  And that’s not quite as simple as it sounds for a variety of reasons related to how I manage email aliases and the options available with my current ISP.

Oh joy.

Ironically, a friend was just telling me how his 15 year old daughter hardly uses email at all.  She uses IM & Facebook instead.  The only emails she gets are from her parents.  Apparently email is so 1990s or something.

Public Course: Developing Agile Teams

I’m happy to announce that my colleague Dale Emery and I will be hosting a public offering of our course Developing Agile Teams.

When: March 1 – 2, 2007
Where: Mountain View, CA
Cost: US$799

This is a methodology-agnostic workshop in which we focus on the core values and practices that make a team Agile.  This experiential course centers around an extended simulation, giving participants an opportunity to practice the skills we’re teaching.  For more information, see the extended course description.  Or reserve your seat now.

Agile2007: Call for Proposals, and for Reviewers

Got an Agile Experience Report you want to share?  Maybe you have an idea you’d like to explore in a Discovery Session?  Or perhaps you have a Tutorial you’d like to present?  The Agile2007 Call for Proposals is now open.  We’re actively looking for various types of sessions.  Please consider submitting a proposal!

Also, I am the Tutorial Track chair and am actively seeking reviewers for tutorials.  All proposals are peer-reviewed, and that means we need lots of reviewers.  The work involves reading proposals and providing comments.  It doesn’t take too much time, and you’ll be contributing to the overall quality of the conference.  Interested?  Please email me.  (And if we haven’t met yet, please tell me a little about yourself and your experience with Agile.)

New Website Design
I finally got the latest version of the www.qualitytree.com website up this weekend.  Hop on over and take a look!  And I’d love your feedback…drop me an email or a comment and tell me what you think.