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Welcome to an exciting episode of the expert interview series featuring Andrew Knight, famously known as “The Automation Panda.” Andrew is a renowned advocate for software quality, dedicating his passion and expertise to BDD, test automation, software testing, and software development. Andrew is a sought-after international speaker, engaging audiences at conferences, webinars, and workshops. His software blog, AutomationPanda.com, serves as a valuable resource for those navigating the complexities of software quality.
Andrew currently serves as the Principal Architect at Cycle Labs, based in Raleigh, North Carolina. In this hybrid role, he contributes to optimizing business processes in the supply chain and warehouse domain using the Cycle testing platform. Join us as we unwind Andrew’s journey, insights, and the evolving landscape of software quality.
? How did you come up with the idea of Automation Panda (1:03)
Answer – Great question so back in 2016 gosh so long ago now hard to believe I had recently joined Lexus Nexus and it was the first time that I become a senior engineer so I was like oh fancy I have arrived at a big career goal a milestone I’m now senior, people should be listening to me finally right and I asked myself what’s next like what’re the next steps of my career right and what I realized is that up until that point pretty much all of my work had been behind closed company doors and so even you know generic Wiki pages about best practices they were all stuck internally to some company and I’m like wait a minute that stuff is fairly generic right there’s nothing proprietary about it it be really cool if I could share that more widely because I started see seeing other people in the software development and testing space you know they have blogs they speak at conferences I’m like why can’t I do that.
So I decided as a New Year’s resolution for 2017 that I was going to start writing a Blog and so I didn’t know what I was doing I had ideas to write about but I was like okay so how do I make my website like what do I do I found wordpress.com super simple they take care of everything it’s like brainless right you just go in there and type stuff I’m like cool easy right pay a little money boom.
I’m like okay I need a name because nobody knows my name Andrew Knight and if you Google Android Knight there’s like a ton of Android knights in the world I’m like I need something catchy and so it’s like all right the trend in software right now is you have a project you name it after a vegetable or an animal well I like pandas and everybody likes pandas they’re cute they’re cuddly all that stuff what am I going to talk about test automation Panda boom right registered the domain name and there we were next thing you know it’s like like once a week.
I was writing a new article because I was into it and then here we are today nice that’s quite a story.
Have Blogs got out of style?
I would say that blogs haven’t gone out of style because when you write articles it’s text-based content and so text-based content is very easy to spread and to consume it’s also got a much lower barrier to entry to produce you know if you’re doing video production you know you need a good camera you need the lights like I spent like $400 on these lights that are on me right now I look good right but a lot of people aren’t willing or able to jump into that plus you need a good microphone and then you got to tune it and tweak it and you’re never satisfied with the production.
You’re always trying to do it better where’s a Blog you need a keyboard right and then you push the publish button and it’s out there and it’s easy to consume and also like all the chat gpts and AIS they pick it up now so it’s like right making the life easier now exactly so I would say it’s not that blogs have become outdated or gone out of style it’s just there are other kinds of content and they still have their.
?? How did you transition from being a Software QA Engineer to your current role as a Principal Architect at Cycle Labs? (4:32)
Answer – Well as a software quality Champion if you could call it that you know, I had been software engineering test right and always Building Solutions to testing problems and it was I never identified so much as a tester as just a software engineer focused on a particular domain and that domain happened to be testing and that’s why I was very heavy into automation versus manual or exploratory testing because I love coding I love building things I’m a builder at heart and so being that software engineer in test for about a decade or so it’s like you you are essentially a developer right.
You’re Building scalable systems you have to you know think of clean code practices you have to be testing your tests you have to worry about scale right you know all these kinds of things and then you know on the side I would do other kinds of projects too like I’m very involved in the python Community you know.
I’ve built web apps on the side using things like Jango flask and fast API right and a couple of years ago I transitioned from being a software engineering test to being a developer Advocate at App Tools Right in that role you know I wasn’t responsible day to day for making sure that tests are running and coverage is happening that kind of freed me up a little bit to do other kinds of things and then coming into cycle Labs.
I actually had a bit of personal history with the company and the people behind it, they’re located here in Raleigh North Carolina where I live I’ve known this team for a long time, in fact, the CEO of the company found me through my blog automation panda.com back in 2018 that’s how we first met and so the timing was right and so I joined cycle labs and they wanted me to essentially be like their principal engineer the one who is guiding the product development from a technical aspect right knowing what we need to build into this platform because produces a test automation platform for supply chain Warehouse so it’s like I’m in one sense I’m kind of back in that software engineer and test role.
I’m Building Solutions to testing problems it’s just rather than being the one responsible for the execution of tests for some company I am building the platform that other companies use for their testing right that’s I’m still building a testing platform it’s just in a different kind of context so that’s kind of how that that transition happened than and how do the job like I mean is it more convenient does it give more time to you oh my gosh I love my new job it’s wonderful it’s it’s really cool because I feel empowered to do the right things for the platform you know I don’t have to fight as many you know internal political battles because I’m trusted I’ve known these folks for forever and they know me and they they trust me which is really nice and so like I’ve kind of Taken ownership of the product road map for our platform and I’m I’m already working on some cool projects I don’t want to share them yet because they’re not released but they’re they’re coming soon and stuff we’re doing is really cool so being able to be hands on developing that and to be able to you know deliver it it’s going to be really
? As a former Director of Test Automation University (TAU), what motivated the creation of TAU, and how did it contribute to the testing community? (8:13)
Answer – exciting sure great question so T gosh that started the first courses came out in 2019 okay it t is run by Apple tools which is my previous employer I was not the one who created ta that that pre-existed me it was it was the brainchild of people at appls and Angie Jones was the one who really spearheaded it other guy Raja he was kind of in the background helping I know this because I saw his names on all the credentials right but but it at from its launch for the first I guess 1923 years it was really driven hard by Angie Jones she was was the one you know leading it she was the one working with the instructors mapping out the courses for the content and all and so I first found out about it because I had worked with Angie Jones previously and so you know I followed her on LinkedIn and Twitter and I see she’s pumping out this T thing I’m like wow that’s so cool that’s amazing I wish I could be part of it and then in Spring of 2019 I think it was she reached out to me and she was like hey Andy do you want to publish a course on ta and I’m like absolutely yes right and so my first course on ta was web element locator strategies which was how do you write like an X pass the CSS selectors and how do you choose to use IDs or something else right and it was because I’ve written an article on the panda blog about web element locators and then she read it she’s like this will make a great due course.
I’m like sure and then later I had developed a series of three courses on python testing there’s one on pest one on selenium and one on Pest bdd and so I published those and then years later I actually worked at APPL tools and as soon as I joined Angie left and so I essentially became I essentially took over ta right so I became director and so I was doing the things that Angie was doing when I had left I think there were about 70 courses from about 50 different instructors and if you look at the set of instructors it’s all very well-known respected leaders in the testing space you know we got people like Philip Ritz who who has done the redid the Cypress learning path we have rata Andrade who’s who’s did the playwright path you know we’ve got like Angie Jones herself has delivered a number of courses I’m up there you know and the list list goes on and on and on and you’re like wow this is this is a Star studed action-packed platform ja Avengers yeah yeah exactly exactly it’s like the Avengers it’s the Avengers of test automation it’s pretty
?️ Could you share your experience with tools like Cypress and Playwright? What do you find most valuable about these tools in the context of test automation? (11:02)
Answer – incredible sure sure so I mean as we all know there’s this almost like this war raging between the different browser automation tools right now I mean personally I my favorite one is is playright I was the first playwright Ambassador now there’s about 10 of us but what I really like about play right specifically is first of all its speed how fast it runs I mean they they’ve really really optimized that I love how the the syntax is very user friendly especially coming from that more traditional selenium background in the past I feel like as I’m writing my playr code is like page locator boom click right it just kind of flows with me that’s more of a personal thing I know some people are like I don’t like it fine you know it works in my mind and the way my mind works right and I also like that that it has multiple language bindings you know the the core implementation is no JS but it does provide bindings for Java C and python so you know it’s you don’t have to learn JavaScript just to use playright which is which is really really nice okay the other tools are all still good too it’s not like I hate these other tools it’s it’s that of of a toolbox of very good tools.
I have one of preference but it doesn’t mean that the others are not good I think Cypress is also very good what I respect about Cypress is that it was the first truly modern web testing framework right it it’s the the framework that put developer experience at the Forefront that that it would pop up this window and kind of Step you through step by step as your test is running you could see how your test is running could debug very easily and and it it made it easier to write tests in a and it wasn’t as heavy weight as say you know traditional selenium test Automation and it became the darling of front end developers because now they have a tool that’s already completely in their stack in their browser with them and so it made their end to end testing a lot easier to the point where Cypress testing became synonymous with endtoend testing like it’s the PE there was a certain segment of people couldn’t even imagine so using selenium anymore so that was that was something that that was very impactful that Cypress did that that to this day still lws respect and there’s nothing wrong with selenium either I mean it’s it’s classic it’s it’s it still works it’s fairly performing if you can tune it right it’s just you need to have layers on top of it because you shouldn’t just be making raw cenum
? How should someone start learning? (13:54)
Answer – calls what I would say is first and foremost it is is it is far more important for you to learn good programming skills than to learn whatever tool or framework is is hot right now because if you can learn how to do programming well you’re going to become a much better Problem Solver and you’re not going to get stuck over silly little things and I would say pick one of the major languages in test automation of course if if you’re trying to orient towards a particular job do that but I mean Java is a solid Choice javascript’s a solid Choice C is a solid choice and python is a solid Choice what what I’ve seen is that Java and JavaScript are dominant C and python are are second in the wing and after that like the other languages aren’t really used for for heavy test automation you know you can like every language has a unit test framework right but as far as people using a programming language for for major blackbox end to end test automation you just don’t see it you know Ruby in the past was but I’ve seen the metrics on that like it it crashed hard you know.
So I would stick to one of those four big languages and then after you get good with programming or if you’re already good with programming then when you pick up a particular tool or framework to learn again like principles matter more than mechanics right make sure that you’re mindful of how you model your interactions well that you’re picking the right kinds of locators that you’re you’re you’re waiting for elements to be ready on the page appropriately that kind of thing and from there if you can keep those principles in mind the tool ultimately doesn’t matter as much you’re just trying to learn some syntax and so there are a wealth of resources out there to learn how to use a tool for what test automation University would be the number one thing I would recommend right because there are entire learning paths about selenium Cyprus and
?? As an international speaker, what are the key messages or topics you find resonate most with your audience? (16:11)
Answer – playright I kind of right now I have like a a set of talks that I typically give I talk a lot about play rights right and and when I talk about playright I don’t want to just be like here’s how click a button here’s how you scrape text what I want people to understand with playwright is how this is a modern web testing framework like it is something that meets our needs for today it it is something that not only can handle our tests but can can help us shift how we approach testing web apps right and so I walk through what that looks like and then I I usually do like a a live demo of the tool I have spoken a lot about different kinds of test strategy like how do you go about building good test cases good test Suites that kind of thing there’s a a well-known talk I’ve given where I compare my software testing convictions to Japanese woodblock art as you can see like the Japanese art on the back of my wall I’m a big fan and and how you know like these Japanese artists back in the day they were masters of The Craft and how they put such high quality into their work what can we learn from that right.
I’ve spoken about test data specifically managing the test data nightmare because it is an underserved problem that everybody suffers right what are the ways that we can handle it like should we be preparing data ahead of time or should we be dynamically creating new data as our test run you know should we be cloning databases or walking things like going walking through all those strategies weighing the pros and cons and giving recommendations there in fact today I’m I’m giving a talk right after our session with the test tribe as you know I’m I’m big into the python community and I love python testing and so I’m giving a live introduction to python testing with py test where there there no slides there’s no script there’s a terminal and vs code and I go show people here’s how you use py test W right you know from the ground up so that’s a good get a good bit of my talks I’m probably I think I’ve talked about other things I just can’t remember off the top of my head have these records we have these you know recorded talks yeah there yes in fact if you go to automation panda.com speaking I have the entire history with links as recordings have been
? How do you stay updated on the latest developments in software testing? (18:44)
Answer – Oh my gosh it’s so hard because there’s so much happening all the time dayto day I stay plugged into LinkedIn and X formerly known as Twitter because I have my feed there where I can see where all the people in the space are and what they’re doing I also am intentional to go to several testing events and conferences throughout the year as you know as you just I speak a lot so I get around a lot but when I’m at those events I not only is it there for me to speak but it’s there for me to learn right and so I attend other talks to hear what’s happening what are people doing what technologies are out there what platforms are coming up and also so if they have an expo hall I go talk to the vendors to see what they’re trying to sell unfortunately usually that means I get a whole bunch of email spam afterward but at the very least I can keep a pulse on where the industry is moving so that I know how to keep up and I can help my own company keep up as
? As we conclude, do you have any final thoughts or advice for aspiring professionals in the software testing and automation domain? (19:48)
Answer – Well absolutely first I would say never give up things can get tough people can beat you down, bugs can be hard to squash but be tenacious right never give up always be learning because there’s so much out there it can be intimidating to keep up but it’s not impossible one thing I will say is that in 2024 we have more resources than ever before right I had to learn from the School of Hard Knocks of trying and failing with literally no help no books no courses right that’s not the case today we have material and we have each other there’s a whole community within software testing in automation you know like that’s how we connect that’s how we can encourage each other so get plugged into to all of that is what I would say subscribe to our Channel and hit the Bell icon to never miss a video from us
