[NCLUG] [ColoSPIN] [xpdenver] SQuAD October 2004 Newsletter (fwd from: dlbehrens at comcast.net)
Evelyn Mitchell
efm at tummy.com
Thu Oct 7 10:52:58 MDT 2004
With the upcoming election, I thought this might be of interest.
Evelyn Mitchell
efm at tummy.com
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Subject: [ColoSPIN] [xpdenver] SQuAD October 2004 Newsletter
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SOFTWARE QUALITY ASSN. IN DENVER
SQuAD News Bytes
<www.geocities.com/denver_squad/>
Current Meeting
Upcoming SQuAD Meetings
Conference Recap
Quality In The News
QA Jobs List
Calendar of Events
Noteworthy Web Sites
================================
Join us for the October SQuAD Meeting
<www.geocities.com/denver_squad/>
Tuesday, October 12, 2004
4:30 pm, networking, refreshments
5:00 p.m., presentation,
QA book giveaway,
free Better Software magazines
----------------------------
Panel discussion:
Electronic Voting Machines
Panelists:
SysTest Labs: Carolyn Coggins, Gail Audette
Boulder County: Paul Danish, Joe Pezzillo
SQUAD: Jon Hagar, Cathy Kiser
Qwest Auditorium
1005 17th Street
Downtown Denver, CO
The Qwest Auditorium is located in the Qwest Building at the Corner
of 17th
and Curtis)
(For more information on parking & directions go to the SQuAD website
<www.geocities.com/denver_squad/>)
================================
Upcoming SQuAD Meetings
The next regular SQuAD meeting will be
Tuesday, November 9th, 4:30pm
at Qwest Auditorium, Denver.
Topic:
“Moving Targets Throughout the Development Life Cycle
- Implementing a solid change control process”
Speaker: Jeff Tatelman, CSTE
================================
SQuAD Conference Recap
Close to 300 Quality professionals attended the SQuAD 2004 Conference. Our
featured speakers were James Whittaker, Bret Petticord, and Johanna Rothman.
See the SQuAD website for pictures.
Ruth Yoon and Mark Jonjak won the conference registrations.
A large variety of books, donated by SQuAD and ProtoTest were given as door
prizes.
================================
Quality Problems in the News
Electronic Voting Machines: Software development projects fail all the time,
no matter what their size. The Standish Group, an IT-research firm in West
Yarmouth, Mass., has been keeping track of this phenomenon since 1994, and
the good news is that we are doing much better at completing projects than
we used to. The bad news is that in 2000, only 28 percent of software
projects could be classed as complete successes (meaning they were executed
on time and on budget), while 23 percent failed outright (meaning that they
were abandoned). Those numbers are improvements over a 16 percent success
rate and a 31 percent failure rate when the first study was done in 1994.”
Robert Cringely, “No Confidence Vote: Why the Current Touch Screen Voting
Fiasco was Pretty Much Inevitable” 12/4/03,
http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20031204.html
There is more information about voting machine problems on sites such as
www.blackboxvoting.com, www.verifiedvoting.org, and www.coloradovoter.net,
--------------------------------
Colorado State Benefits System: As reported in many of Colorado papers,
Colorado’s new government benefits system is having major problems. In a
quote from the Denver Post “According to Maximus Inc., the system was
“flawed from the moment it was initially defined” and was “extremely
difficult to manage.” Maximus also criticized the state government for a
poorly conceived contract, a lack of skilled managers, poor decisionmaking
and lack of time to adequately test the system.” For more information on
this story, see “State took "risky" path” by Denver Post Staff Writers Ross
Wehner and Jeremy Meyer, Sept 29, 2004, www.denverpost.com More stories on
the same subject include:
* “Benefits System to get Help” by Denver Post Staff Writers Ann Schrader
and Karen Auge’, Sept 28, 2004, www.denverpost.com,
* “Lawsuit Filed over Late Food Stamps, Pension Checks” on Sept 24, 2004,
www.thedenverchannel.com/news/3758460/detail.html,
* “Glitches endanger social services, New state computer system plagued with
operational problems” by Kevin Duggan,
www.coloradoan.com/news/stories/20040925/news/1301230.html.
================================
Colorado QA Jobs List
<groups.yahoo.com/group/Denver_SQG_Jobs/>
This on-line forum serves as a job board for Colorado software quality
professionals, recruiters, and hiring managers. Appropriate postings are
resumes and employment and contract openings within the state of Colorado.
Local professionals in software development process, software development
project management, software requirements, software quality assurance,
software test, and configuration management are encouraged to join this
list.
================================
Calendar of Local Meetings
<my.calendars.net/squad_co/>
Local technical meetings and conferences provide good networking
opportunities for quality professionals. Check for meeting information on
30+ Colorado area technical organizations, including:
* Denver, Boulder, and Pikes Peak Java User Groups, * Assn. for Women in
Communications, * Rocky Mtn. Windows Technology UG, * Agile Denver,
Boulder Writers Alliance, * Int’l Society for Performance Improvement, *
Colorado Women in Technology, * Denver and Northern Colorado Linux Users
and Enthusiasts, * Rocky Mtn Information Management Assn., * National
Assn. of Women Business Owners, * Denver Cold Fusion UG, * Denver and
Co/Wy Cisco UG, ? Boulder Patterns Group, * and many other local
groups. * SEI, ASQ, SQE, and QAI and other conferences around the country
are also listed.
================================
Noteworthy Web Sites for Quality Topics
www.geocities.com/denver_squad/ * SQuAD home
groups.yahoo.com/group/Denver_SQG_Jobs/ * The SQuAD Jobs Board
my.calendars.net/squad_co/ * The SQuAD Tech Calendar
www.stickyminds.com * Better Software Magazine
www.qaforums.com * A wide variety of QA resources
www.qalinks.com * More QA resources
www.asqdenver.org * All aspects of quality in organizations
www.testingfaqs.org * Information resource for software testers
www.agilealliance.org * Testing in an Agile development team
groups.yahoo.com/group/agile-testing * Join the Agile newsgroup
================================
Tom Demarco
Craziness is doing the same thing and expecting a different result.
================================
Disclaimer: These items are provided for informational purposes only.
© 2004 Software Quality Association in Denver
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Regards, tummy.com, ltd
Evelyn Mitchell Linux Consulting since 1995
efm at tummy.com Senior System and Network Administrators
http://www.tummy.com/
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