The Tech Sessions - Deep Dives: Testing Craft & Making Stuff

Location

We are, as always, very thankful to the University of Hull for kindly providing the space for the event. We will be in the Brynmor Jones Library - Teaching Room 4. (See Point 27 on the University Campus Map)

Parking

Parking is available in Wilberforce Multi Storey Car Park as there are no enforcements in that area between 16:00 and 08:30.

Our Speakers

We are delighted to have two speakers for this event.

Speaker: Rory Reid

Title: Writing meaningful, valuable, and maintainable tests

Testing is a muddy world, and it's quite easy to fall into a false sense of security and routine with how you test things. Do your tests feel uninspired and checkbox-y? Does your coverage look good but things still ship broken? Do you feel like you lose so much time fixing tests when refactoring? Here Rory will briefly talk about his journey through testing over his career and detail where it has led him to think about how to build tests, at what level, and with what values in mind. This isn't a "Unit Testing 101" and assumes experience in maintaining a codebase with automated tests, but if you're new to the industry or working in an environment without mature practices yet, this should plant some seeds for your journey forth too.

About Rory

Rory Reid is a senior software engineer at a fintech company, with a background working in the fintech and communications domains. He favours high ownership, quality, and product-minded engineering practices with a skew towards domain-driven design. He likes rats and dogs.

Speaker: Rob Miles

Title: Making Stuff

Do you want an AI that can call you back on an old telephone, a camera that fogs your pictures before you take them, a digital trombone or a moving/flashing/printing/thing you can control from anywhere? If you do, you're in luck, because this session will tell you how to make them. And if you don't want any of these things, you can at least discover the joy of making stuff and how easy it is to work with modern devices. There will be lots of demos and links to resources, and maybe even some free gifts.

About Rob

Rob Miles taught Computer Science at Hull for many years. Since leaving the university he has written a few more books, published the odd article and built lots of devices. He runs the Hardware Meetups at Hull Makerspace and also has an interest in photography, which means he is always saving up for a new camera. You can find out more about his so-called life at www.robmiles.com