Friday, September 17, 2010

TWIST # 12: Interview With Mike Dwyer



I learned a couple of new tricks with Audacity this time around that are helping me bring the time down to produce the show and turn episodes around. I realized that the envelope tool would allow me to make gradual changes to audio volume, but even more important, it could act as a virtual "flying fader"; no more separating tracks and leveling them independently required. I also discovered the chain command "Clean Speech"; it goes through and does a bunch of Nyquist batch commands to clean up vocal tracks. Most important, it automatically removes "dead air". It helps, but manual editing and paying attention to flow still has to happen, so I can't be replaced entirely by a software program... at least not yet :).


Today's interview is with Mike Dwyer, who Matt reverentially referred to as "a grown up in our industry" and one who admonishes us to not forget our past. We have such high turnover in software testing (and development) that each generation, it seems, needs to re-learn the lessons of the generation that preceded it. Mike has experiences with companies like Parker Brothers, Unisys, Wang and others, providing a great retrospective of quality and what it once meant in the heady days before the PC was an everyday item. Today, Mike works to help companies develop 'agile' methods and apply them.


For those who want to check it out, here is Episode #12.

Standard disclaimer:

Each podcast is free for 30 days, but you have to be a basic member to access it. After 30 days, you have to have a Pro Membership to access it, so either head on over quickly (depending on when you see this) or consider upgrading to a Pro membership so that you can get to the podcasts and the entire library whenever you want to :). In addition,  pro membership allows you to access and download to the entire archive of Software Test and Quality Assurance Magazine (as well as issues under its former name, Software Test and Performance).

Again, my thanks to STP for hosting the podcasts and storing the archive. We hope you enjoy listening to them as much as we enjoy making them :).

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