2015 in Review

The beginning of the year seems an appropriate time for looking back at the good and the bad of the previous year. Looking at the data to determine what things I want to continue doing or to develop and what I might want to change.

I had a lofty goal of publishing two posts per month for 2015. I ended the year with 21. Not bad, but I’m going to push my goal higher for 2016 and aim for three. Sometimes when I’m writing I become conflicted about the frequency with which to post. I don’t necessarily want to write about everything little detail. However, when I look back on the posts I have published I’m always happy that I put something out. Still I’d like to side on quality over quantity, so I’m ok if I don’t hit that goal.

Popular posts don’t mean much but they’re still interesting.

Most popular posts of 2015:

• Installing ChromeDriver on Mac OSX
• Recognizing a problem in eBay’s iPad app
• Screen resolution vs Resizing a window in Selenium
• An In-depth look at CAST 2015
• Introducing TestingConferences.org

Three of those popular posts were time intensive to produce and I’m very proud of them. The other two solve specific problems for me and apparently for others as well. There were quite a few other time intensive posts that I’m proud to have written that just missed the top five but would make it in a top ten list. In summary, I’m happy that what I’m writing is getting some attention.

2015 marked a few big launches: In February I moved to publishing all my writing here instead of at that old blog. In October I launched an open source list of software testing conferences and workshops at TestingConferences.org and I’m delighted and surprised every time someone commits an update.

A few other tidbits about 2015:

• Didn’t get to read as many books as I had originally planned to. Not sure if 2016 will be much of an improvement. Most of the books I read are non-fiction / reference and I know that will shift next year to more fiction / sci-fi. On the positive side, I read a lot of blog posts and articles!
• I haven’t yet sent out the first email to the amazing people on my email list but that will happen soon! 2016 is the year! If you haven’t already, join the email list!
• I realized I don’t like the layout of this site / template and want to change it’s look and feel. Maybe I’ll get to it in 2016?
• I taught just a little bit of scuba diving but a lot of software testing. 2016 will be even more.