Author: Robert Hyatt
Date: 07:43:16 09/07/00
Go up one level in this thread
On September 06, 2000 at 18:50:05, Uri Blass wrote: >On September 06, 2000 at 18:32:35, Uri Blass wrote: > >>On September 06, 2000 at 17:29:41, Steven Schwartz wrote: >> >>>Thanks to José de Jesús García Ruvalcaba we have a new >>>poll question. It appears to be a hot topic here now. >>> >>>You are invited to vote at the CCC polling site: >>>http://www.icdchess.com/ccc/poll/index.shtml >> >> >>I voted for paying more for the beta testers but I think that it is dependent in >>the job that they do. >> >>If the testers do the job that I read that the chessmaster8000 beta testers >>did(only playing 30 games against different personalities at fast time control) >>then I think that getting the new version is enough(I think that in this case >>they also get the real new version) >> >>If the testers help the programmers by giving ideas and not only play some hours >>against the program then it is not enough. >> >>I could abstain but I felt that I had to vote for the beta testers after I read >>the idea that the programmers do the beta testers a favour. >> >>The beta testers can test the commercial programs and I do not see the big >>advantage of getting it some monthes before the release of a new version when >>beta testers do not get even it because they get only the beta version that they >>test that is usually slightly weaker. >> >>In my case the fact that I was a beta tester of Junior4.x did not save me from >>buying Junior5 in order to test later Junior5.x >> >>Uri > >I can add that I do not blame other people for this fact and it is my fault that >I tried to give ideas when I was not asked for it but I understand that other >people see the job of the beta tester as giving more than games so I had to vote >for the beta testers. > >If there was a clear definition of the beta tester as someone that has a job to >work not more than 10-15 hours and give only games then I could vote in a >different way. > >Uri I personally believe that there is great misconception in the term "beta testing". The correct details of what is to be done is normally that you receive the beta version, and you use it as though it were a production version, but with specific error-reporting requirements. That is how most beta testing is done. In rarer cases, beta testing is used to look for more specific things. IE "will this program install on many different configurations of hardware and operating system versions?" which might be hard to answer in a lab setting. "playing a few games at short time controls" is _not_ "beta testing". Unless someone has coined a new beta testing description that is different from the SE books I use. With what I have read here so far, _most_ are not doing beta testing, and getting a free copy of a program is probably quite fair. Some (Uri for example) go much deeper into things looking for obvious (or not-so-obvious) flaws that need attention. Spending that much time is definitely worth paying for. It would seem that the current beta testing approach isn't working very well, based on the later bugs and bugfix versions released. The testers aren't getting much for their efforts. The programmers aren't getting a lot of effort from the testers. Seems 'equitable' in a way. :)
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