Networking from 6-7, Seminar from 7-8:00 PM Event is open to anyone - this is a free talk. Come in early for free pizza provided by the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference!

Abstract: Estimates are required multiple times in a project. Project members need to make estimates for a variety of reasons, these include: • The amount of time for a task; • The cost for resources; • The cost of software, hardware and other materials; • The time required to finish a task. However, there are many problems with estimates. This presentation focuses on the sociological and psychological aspects of doing estimates. It teaches attendees the environmental issues that affect estimates and how to deal with their impact. Through class interaction, it shows both the psychological and sociological factors that affect how estimates are given and provides leaders with tools to help avoid the common pitfalls. By avoiding these situations, estimates become more representative of the project and more variation more predictable. Controlling both of these, help the Project Manager avert trouble. This a very interactive and fun presentation. It has a short exercise and throughout the presentation, attendees are asked to make estimates on doing the exercise again under a number of situations to help better learn from their own behavior.

Speaker Bio: Todd Williams has thirty years experience as a Project Manager, Architect, entrepreneur and businessperson. He has spent twenty of those years recovering red projects. From this experience, he has developed a process to make the recoveries more efficient. His experience also provides a plethora of invaluable knowledge on avoiding project failure. He has worked in manufacturing and service industries for products used internally and externally to the companies developing them. The projects include large-scale system integration of manufacturing systems, equipment integration, web-based collaboration tools, thick clients with automated update via the internet and large-scale business systems integration. The projects have been in Taiwan, Singapore, Canada, the United States and Israel. The teams have been dispersed in as many as five countries, three continents and countless time zones. Some of these projects were captive in-house time and materials projects while others were outsourced fixed-priced projects.

Mr. Williams is the President of eCameron, Inc., located in the Portland, Oregon metropolitan area, and specializes in recovering red projects. He is a published author and regularly publishes a Project Management Technique eZine.

Directions: Room 86-01 is located between the Engineering Building and the Fourth Avenue Building on the PSU campus. Enter through the Engineering Building at 1930 SW Fourth Avenue, go down the stairs and through the hall directly ahead. Street parking is available.

Rose City SPIN: The Rose City Software Process Improvement Network (SPIN) is a monthly forum for networking, mutual support, and promotion of effective software practices. We exchange practical experiences, ideas, knowledge, wisdom, and war stories about the technical, business, and human facets of software process improvement. The Rose City SPIN serves the software development community of the Portland/Vancouver metro area. Whether you work for a large company or a small one, corporate or self-employed, industrial or academic setting, you are welcome at the Rose City SPIN.

Questions? Contact Rhea Stadick at [email protected]

Abstract: Seeing Software Quality through an Agile Lens ...or Scrum can’t buy you love (or quality), but it can get you there much faster.

For a software quality engineer entering an Agile team for the first time, the transition can be extreme. The traditional software quality practices and activities change in many ways but, looking closely, the core principles are still there. In fact, Agile development can be an SQE’s dream! Agile naturally combines all factors that impact quality from people to transparency all in a cohesive system.

Join Rhea as she details her experience of going from a waterfall background and jumping head first into an Agile development environment. She will focus on how she applied quality practices in this environment, road bumps along the way that any team adopting Agile might encounter, and how Agile enabled levels of quality beyond all previous expectations.

Bio:

Rhea Stadick is a software quality manager for product engineering teams in the Business Client group at Intel. She is focused on developing a sustained, strong capability in engineering teams to deliver high quality products. Over the last several years she has become an advocate for agile development and is an agile coach as well as a co-director of the Intel Agility Catalyst team promoting the adoption of agile culture and methodologies throughout the organization. Rhea graduated from Oregon State University with a Bachelor of Science Honors degree in Computer Science and is currently finishing her MBA at Willamette University.

A Special Treat from PNSQC

Networking at 5:30, seminar at 6:30. Plan on coming early! In collaboration with the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference (PNSQC) the SPIN meeting will have pizza and pop provided by PNSQC beginning at 5:30 pm.

PNSQC is the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference, a group of volunteers interested in Software Quality. The Mission of the PNSQC is to enable knowledge exchange to produce higher quality software. As a non-profit, it seeks to promote software quality by providing education and opportunities for information exchange within the software community.

How to Register

No need to register! This is a FREE lecture sponsored by the Rose City SPIN. But you can help us plan food and drinks by registering at: http://www.eventbrite.com/event/3100344213

Rose City SPIN

The Rose City Software Process Improvement Network (SPIN) is a monthly forum for networking, mutual support, and promotion of effective software practices. We exchange practical experiences, ideas, knowledge, wisdom, and war stories about the technical, business, and human facets of software process improvement. The Rose City SPIN serves the software development community of the Portland/Vancouver metro area. Whether you work for a large company or a small one, corporate or self-employed, industrial or academic setting, you are welcome at the Rose City SPIN.

In partnership with the Intel Agile Conference, Rose City SPIN is proud to present this panel discussion on “Agile and the Enterprise”

This will be an open discussion with the panel speakers around the topic of Agile and the Enterprise. Some questions will be facilitated but bring your burning questions about Agile as the audience will be able to ask questions of the panel. This is your opportunity to generate discussion about Agile and Lean topics with some of the top minds in the industry!

About Our Speakers

Mary Poppendieck (poppendieck.com) teaches and consults worldwide on Lean principles for software. Her approach identifies real business value and enables product teams to realize that value.

Ron Jeffries is one of the 3 founders of the Extreme Programming (XP) software development methodology circa 1996, along with Kent Beck and Ward Cunningham. He was from 1996, an XP coach on the Chrysler Comprehensive Compensation System project, which was where XP was invented. He is an author of Extreme Programming Installed, the second book published about XP. He has also written Extreme Programming Adventures in C#. He is one of the 17 original signatories of the Agile Manifesto.

Chet Hendrickson specializes in assisting software organizations become more effective through the use of agile software techniques. A co-author of Extreme Programming Installed, Chet has taught Extreme Programming's values and practices around the world

How to Register

No need to register! This is a FREE lecture sponsored by the Rose City SPIN. But you can help us plan by registering at: http://www.eventbrite.com/event/3127126319

About the Rose City SPIN

The Rose City Software Process Improvement Network (SPIN) is a monthly forum for networking, mutual support, and promotion of effective software practices. We exchange practical experiences, ideas, knowledge, wisdom, and war stories about the technical, business, and human facets of software process improvement. The Rose City SPIN serves the software development community of the Portland/Vancouver metro area. Whether you work for a large company or a small one, corporate or self-employed, industrial or academic setting, you are welcome at the Rose City SPIN.

SQAUG Presents:

Murky Waters: Where Do Tests Come From? A discussion about requirements, and other sources for the development of test cases

Moderated by: Mary Torres Lead QA Engineer, Viewpoint Construction Software, Portland, OR

at Con-Way 2055 NW Savier, Portland, OR 97209 on Wednesday April 17, 2013 5:30pm until 7:30pm

Where do tests come from? Pittsburg. No not really. Actually, we hope to discuss the various sources for tests in the different SDLC environments. We want everyone to share good practices for gleaning information needed for testing, including; rummaging through requirements, user stories, acceptance criteria, code commentary, etc. Do your Product Managers write up test cases, DEV’s? Business Analysts? Tech facilitators? Remember Use Cases? Much of what we used to do, has become muddled and wrapped up in terminology and processes that no longer mean the same things they used to. Let’s talk it through and see if we can help each other in this murky water.

Mary Torres; our moderator for this event currently works at Viewpoint Construction Software as Lead QA Engineer. She a degree in Computer Science, has almost 17 years working in the software industry, and has worked in QA for that entire time. Her work experience includes QA management, automated testing, and functional testing. She is also a certified scrum master. Mary has worked on projects that have utilized traditional Waterfall and Agile/Scrum SDLC’s.

Event is FREE and Open to the Public

Agenda: 5:30-6:00PM: Pizza, Networking and SQAUG Announcements 6:00-7:30PM: Scheduled Moderator: Mary Torres

Details: • Event is Free to the public • Onsite parking (directions below) • Light dinner and beverages will be served • No RSVP is required to attend

SQAUG is Portland/Vancouver area’s only Software Quality Assurance User Group! We are NEW, and would like to extend a warm welcome to everyone who would like to participate in a user group dedicated to growing the Quality Assurance field.

SQAUG is made up of a group of SQA professionals who have banded together in an open forum to learn from each other through a series of interactive discussions, engaged debates, training presentations, exploring tools, and general networking and sharing of job opportunities. Our goals are to expand knowledge about Software Quality to all professionals who are passionate about their careers, and take Software Quality seriously.

For more on SQAUG: http://www.sqaug.org/ Linked in: SQAUG Meetup: SQAUGPDX

The Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference wants you to speak at our conference! We want hear from you about what you're working on. We're accepting abstracts now for speakers for October's conference, and want to work with you to speed up the application process. Come get your questions answered and have some food on us.

The Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference is hosting a gathering for authors, poster presenters, reviewers, conference attendees, and organizers. You can get tips on writing drafts, get any questions answered, meet the software quality community, and converse with other presenters.

Food and non-alcoholic drinks will be provided for the group.

It's not too late to register or volunteer for PNSQC, the Northwest's premier software quality conference. Attend the conference, watch the keynotes, talk to paper and poster presenters, come to the official party.

Build a bridge to becoming an author and speaker, study and develop ideas in quality engineering, meet other like-minded volunteers.

Please join us for a brainstorming session.

Food and non-alcoholic drinks will be provided for the group.

(Pacific NW Software Quality Conferences are designed to enable knowledge exchange to produce higher quality software. This meeting is the first step in producing content in our own software quality roles and for PNSQC in October 2014.)

PNSQC Presents:

Join PNSQC board members and supporters in downtown Portland at Glyph Cafe on April 9 to discuss our upcoming conference with other software quality advocates. You'll learn how you can get involved in the conference by submitting an abstract proposal. Submission deadline is April 17.

Lean Project Management Specialist Kathy Iberle will give a short talk, and you'll have the chance to sign up to present a Lightning Talk. We're encouraging speakers to turn their talks into abstract proposals for the 2014 conference.

Location: Glyph Cafe - Downtown Portland Date: April 9th, 6:00pm

RSVP's appreciated but all are more than welcome. Event detail questions: email Dwayne at [email protected]

Our meetup site.

Now in its 36th year, the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference prioritizes adding and improving the quality of software.

Our industry learns from working with education, healthcare, manufacturing, government sectors, and more. What can those other industries learn from us? Come and find out at PNSQC 2018.

The 37th Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference will be held October 14-16, 2019. With two days of technical talks and keynotes and a full day of workshops, this conference focuses on ways to improve the process of building and deploying software projects and systems.

Tracks Include - People, Management and Leadership - Technologies and Tools (including Machine Learning and AI) - Performance and Security - Automation - Processes, Practices, and Methods - Quality Engineering

Registration information is online https://www.pnsqc.org/2019-conference/2019-registration-information/

Our industry learns from working with education, healthcare, manufacturing, government sectors, and more. What can those other industries learn from us? Come and find out at PNSQC 2019.

This year’s theme for PNSQC is 2020 Vision: Quality Looking Forward. We chose this theme to inspire attendees and speakers to think of ways to learn from the past, and envision ways to achieve quality software in the future.

Just as lighting the Olympic flame before the games is a gesture of ceremony and inspiration, this kickoff of the call for proposals for PNSQC 2020 is a way to spark your imagination to contribute your own vision of quality.

Come hear a "full stack" of lightning talks on visions of quality. What’s in store for software QA in the future as it merges with DevOps. How will you adapt to changing organizational structures, roles and required knowledge? Find out what leaders in the field are thinking and doing.

Get inspired to see yourself presenting in October at PNSQC 2020 Networking afterward for ideas to achieve 2020 vision. Snacks and refreshments available during the talks.

Then prepare to share your own clarity of vision at PNSQC 2020 by submitting a proposal to present at the conference in October.

How do I get involved? To attend, please finish your RSVP here on meetup. If you wish to present at this event, please submit your ideas on PNSQC’s OpenConference site: https://www.openconf.org/pnsqc2020/author/submit.php

This event is open to software developers, IT managers, project managers, product owners, testers, security professionals -- anyone who is passionate about professional software quality.

Whether you’ve given hundreds of talks, just gave your first talk, or perhaps are thinking of giving a talk next year, we all could use tips in not only overcoming our fears of public speaking but getting good at it. As engineering professionals, sometimes we may focus on the engineering problem and analysis yet don’t realize that how we deliver the message can be just as important as the message itself.

If you break a sweat when speaking to more than a few people as we did, you’ll appreciate these transformational tips as Brian and Phil discuss practices for putting together a talk for a conference. As an engineer, learn a step by step pragmatic approach with several techniques and exercises to cure your nervousness and improve your delivery in a systematic way. Public speaking is a top skill for anyone who wants to effect change. Whether speaking to a department, at a meetup or presenting keynotes around the world, Phil and Brian have worked to hone their presentation skills.

You’ve heard “Practice Makes Perfect” right? Well, that’s not quite right. “Practice With Feedback Makes Perfect”. In this free workshop, you will learn systematic methods with exercises so that you can improve on the spot.

Walk away more confident in your ability to improve your public speaking skills with a framework and techniques for improvement.

This is a free three-hour workshop limited to the first 18 people. The content will be in three parts, but each section builds on the previous. Please RSVP on Meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Pacific-NW-Software-Quality-Conference-PNSQC/events/266871919

Both Brian and Phil are officers and board members of the Pacific NW Software Quality Conference (PNSQC).

Brian Gaudreau is a seasoned quality professional with 20+ years of management, software testing and QA experience relevant to telecom, enterprise metadata, government, multimedia, health care and marketing CRM platforms.

Philip Lew, CEO of XBOSoft, has founded and managed companies in his 25+ year professional career. He frequently can be found speaking at conferences including Softec Asia, HUSTEF, TestIstanbul and StarEast.

PNSQC, in association with PDX Blacks in Technology, is happy to present "Three Steps to Better Estimation" with Moss Drake.

How many times has someone asked you how long it would take to build some software even before they have told you how it might work? Do you think you could estimate a series of random tasks within 90% accuracy? We’ll do an interesting exercise in estimation and then talk about the value your estimates provide. We will talk about three steps to improve your estimates right away and discuss other methods of estimation.

This event will be hosted by PDX Blacks in Technology with networking and food sponsored by PNSQC.

Agenda: 5 pm - Network & social 6-ish - Announcements & Lighting Talk

Bio: Moss Drake has over 30 years of experience developing software and leading software projects. Which, coincidentally, is about the same amount of time he has been encountering managers in hallways and answering the question “How long will it take to build X?”

There's still time to submit a proposal to present at PNSQC 2020. And, to help you get inspired, we are hosting the second annual Pitchfest to give you quick feedback on ideas.

What is a Pitchfest? Speaking at PNSQC 2020 is your chance to share your software quality expertise and experience on trends, process improvement and technology solutions. The Pitchfest is your chance to quickly propose and iterate on an idea before submitting it.

Why show up for a Pitchfest? - You have an idea for a paper, but don't know "if it's good enough" - You have the germ of an idea and want to refine it before writing a proposal - You're curious what ideas other people have - You have questions about the overall paper/presenter/speaking "thing" - You want to have appetizers and something to drink while networking with software quality professionals

Appetizers will be provided by PNSQC. We are meeting in the "Barrel Room" (ask at the bar if you can't find it).

Even if you can't attend the Pitchfest, check out the program committee's "wish list" for topics. Remember, proposals for papers must be received by April 15th, 2020 at 11:59 PM PDT.

Here is the URL to submit a proposal https://www.pnsqc.org/2020-conference/call-proposals/

Here is the link to the "wish list" https://www.pnsqc.org/a-pnsqc-wish-list-topics-to-inspire-your-vision-for-quality/

PNSQC’s mission statement is to enable knowledge exchange to produce higher quality software. The event is free and open to all interested.

UPDATE: Due to Coronavirus, this session will be held online. Join here:

https://cvent.zoom.us/wc/join/170670023

PNSQC, in association with PDX Veterans in Technology, is pleased to present "Secrets of Test-Driven Development" with James Shore.

Test-Driven Development (TDD) is an essential part of agile software development. Without it, codebases lose the flexibility they need to change direction and respond to new business needs.

But what is TDD, exactly? And how does it work? In this brief introduction, expert TDD practitioner James Shore will show you what TDD is, how it works, and why it works. You’ll leave with new insights about this key software development practice.

This event will be hosted by PDX Veterans in Technology with networking and food sponsored by PNSQC.

The agenda is:

• 6 - 6:30 Networking & Food
• 6:30 - 6:35 Quick intro to event , thank sponsors.
• 6:35 - 7:05 Presentation
• 7:05 - 8:00 Q & A, Socialize
• 8p - Good night

James Shore teaches, writes, and consults on Agile development processes with an emphasis on technical excellence. He is a recipient of the Agile Alliance's Gordon Pask Award for Contributions to Agile Practice, co-author of The Art of Agile Development, host of “Let's Code: Test-Driven JavaScript,” and co-creator of the Agile Fluency® Model.

InfoQ has named him one of the “most influential people in Agile.” You can find his screencasts at letscodejavascript.com and essays at jamesshore.com.

Moss Drake will represent PNSQC to talk about the call for abstracts and the conference this year.

The 38th Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference will be held October 12-14, 2020. For this year’s conference, we’re focusing on Quality Looking Forward — how AI is changing the industry, staying ahead of hacks on the security front, managing remote teams during COVID-19, and where software quality is heading in the future. PNSQC 2020 will be online this year, so you can easily join keynotes, technical presentations, panels, and workshops. Stream the conference to watch from the comfort of your home office, or next to your cat or dog on the couch. Early bird pricing is just $95 for all three days, which includes a hands-on security vulnerability testing workshop. Join us for October 12-14, 2020, by registering now.

Tracks Include - People, Management and Leadership - Technologies and Tools (including Machine Learning and AI) - Performance and Security - Automation - Processes, Practices, and Methods - Quality Engineering

Registration information is online https://www.pnsqc.org/2020-conference/

Our industry learns from working with education, healthcare, manufacturing, government sectors, and more. What can those other industries learn from us? Come and find out at PNSQC 2020.

Come Together for the 2021 Culture Jam!

It’s time to open the PNSQC 2021 Call for Papers with a Culture Jam. This year the theme is Quality Coming Together. As we begin planning for the conference, we’re hosting an afternoon of lightning talks to have a meeting of minds and get your ideas flowing for new proposals on software quality.

Each speaker will have 15 minutes to get to the point and convey their ideas on the theme of how quality comes together for their teams, organizations and projects.

This is the official opening of the call for papers for the 2021 conference. It will be held virtually with breaks for networking, announcements and PNSQC 2020 Conference Award presentations.

How do I get involved?

• If you want to present, please submit your ideas here: https://forms.gle/qp7eJywD6ycViNuu6

• If you want to attend, please RSVP through Meetup. https://www.meetup.com/Pacific-NW-Software-Quality-Conference-PNSQC/events/275421880/

Watch past Culture Jam events on PNSQC’s youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/PNSQC/playlists

PNSQC’s mission statement is to enable knowledge exchange to produce higher quality software. The event is free and open to all interested.

The 39th Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference will be held October 11-13, 2021. The conference theme is Quality Coming Together — how all the separate people, teams, processes, libraries and ideas come together to build a quality system (or not). PNSQC 2021 will be online this year, so you can easily join keynotes, technical presentations, panels, and workshops. Stream the conference to watch from the comfort of your home office, or next to your cat or dog on the couch. Early bird pricing extended until September 20th!

Register online https://mms.pnsqc.org/members/evr/regmenu.php?orgcode=PNSQ

Tracks Include - People, Management and Leadership - Technologies and Tools (including Machine Learning and AI) - Performance and Security - Automation - Processes, Practices, and Methods - Quality Engineering

The full schedule is here:

https://www.pnsqc.org/pnsqc-2021-conference-glance/

Our industry learns from working with education, healthcare, manufacturing, government sectors, and more. What can those other industries learn from us? Come and find out at PNSQC 2021.