TDD killed my career.

About 10 years ago I took my first crack at implementing TDD in a project. It was hugely successful in progressing the project and reducing the quality feedback loop. Unfortunately, in the last 5 years this has resulted in my being turned down for a lot of development positions because they aren’t hiring a “tester”.

There are a lot of misconceptions about TDD and what it represents, and the next manager that tells me developers should not test their code is going to get an earful from me.

TDD: Start With A Failing Test

Comment

Tim Ottinger - 2016-12-05 14:27:10-0500

Wow. Just…. wow.

That really is strange. But people don’t understand TDD, I guess.

I have seen too many instances (and even had someone attempt to discredit me by calling me a zealot and a liar at a conference) because they don’t know what TDD is.

Apparently it’s been diluted enough that many people in corporate environments think TDD means “automated testing”, and not “writing new code in the safest way possible”.

I’m sorry that has happened. I don’t know what to do to make it better. I would never wish that on you, and I pity them for not having the knowledge and awareness to hire good TDD programmers.

FWIW, I’m trying as hard as I can to push back on the forces of cluelessness re: agile, TDD, etc. Thanks for your efforts on that front as well.

Plaid Sheep - 2016-12-05 16:01:16-0500

Thanks for the pep-talk. Test automation is itself a worthy en devour, and is important, and is an interesting area of development and system design.

The unfortunate part is that the misinterpretation (by managers) ends up being a tidy excuse for sloppy development. Being on the test side has been educational and good for me.

Really, I think my little rant should be interpreted as “I want (TDD) back”