May 28, 2015

Intro to Page Objects and Design Patterns in Selenium WebDriver

When writing automation scripts, object-oriented design patterns -- templates on how to structure the classes and objects created in Python or Java -- can be quite useful. One of the first design patterns automation engineers encounter are Page Objects, but there are others. Before introducing the talk, here's a quick history lesson on Patterns.

Pattern Languages in Object-Oriented Programming


As part of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), a new group called OOPSLA (Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages & Applications) was formed to address the concept of object-oriented programming which was becoming the dominant programming methodology.

At OOPSLA '87, the group's second conference, Kent Beck -- the future originator of "Extreme Programming", the precursor to Agile -- presented a talk that took the concept of architectural design patterns detailed in A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction (1977) and applied them to software engineering.

May 8, 2015

Learning the Command Line Interface

When I started my Freshman year at Bridgewater State back on September 1990 as an eager Computer Science major and computer lab aide, there were two main platforms that were popular at the time: MS-DOS and Digital Equipment Corps VAX / VMS system, both which used a command line inteface (CLI). 

What did they look like?



  • The screens had a black background. 
  • Green, amber, or white were the font colors. 

Open up the Terminal on your Mac or Powershell on the PC, maximize the window to fill the screen, and that is exactly what it was like. 


May 7, 2015

OWASP Boston Meetup - Crowdsource Your Security Testing with Bugcrowd

Wednesday, May 6, 2015 @ 6:30 pm
Akamai Technologies
8 Cambridge Center, Cambridge, MA 
http://www.meetup.com/owaspboston/events/221696816/ 


At my previous position, I performed a bit of entry-level security testing, so I was familiar with the Open Web Application Security Project Group (OWASP ) name, with their website and the Testing Guide that they update every few years. What I didn't know was that OWASP had formed a Meetup group last year that has met every few months at Akamai Technologies starting in March of 2014.

OWASP - Boston is planning on holding regular meetings on the first Wednesday of every month.