And just like that, it’s over for another year.. UKSTAR 2019, it was an absolute blast! All we can say is WOW! What an incredible 2 days! Over the course of the conference, there was opportunity to discuss learn and explore. With 2 days filled with electric energy, wisdom sharing and non-stop learning within the testing community UKSTAR had so much to offer delegates.

 

 

It is so wonderful so see the testing community come together to support each other, network, learn from each other, discover new testing tools, new ideas, with the help of thought-provoking talks, keynotes and deep dives, and not to forget the brilliant expo and community huddle area.  We are proud to bring to bring such a welcoming community together for 2 days of testing excellence.

 

We love hearing what you guys have to say, whether its on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, your own blog, your company’s blog or elsewhere.  So we have gathered some blogs written by attendees, speakers and exhibitors on their experience at UKSTAR 2019.

 

 

 

An Attendee’s Perspective

Louise Gibbs has written several post describing her great experience at the UKSTAR Conference. She kicked off the conference by attending the opening Keynote by Angie Jones.  Although Louise had seen the talk previous, Angie was such a great, interactive speaker, that she has her sitting on the edge of her seat throughout the talk!

Day 1, part 2 consisted of track talks. Louise decided to attend the talks in the Automation stream. She has wrote a fantastic summary on each of these, which included learning how to fix the pipeline when it needs re-plumbing, learning what to look for in a test automation tool and spotting the difference – visual regression testing.

Louise attended an organic discussion led by Anne-Marie Charrett and Fiona Charles at the lunch break on Day 2 to celebrate International Women’s Day and Women in Tech. Louise learnt something of the reality of testing in a non-diverse teams by other participants of this discussion.

She talks about how people cannot see diversity as an issue, however that is because they aren’t affected by this..

“If someone has never experienced a situation where they are not in a privileged group, how can they understand the situation and its issues.”

A key opportunity for Louise to network, win some prizes and learn from fellow testers, was the Huddle Area, organised by the brilliant Chris Armstrong, (see his blog post below). The Lean Coffee morning was a particular favourite for Louise. This quick session allows people tot get advice on a topic or a question, in a quick and simple manner.  One of topics discussed was ‘Why do we attend conferences? How do we know if they are worth it?’ We loved Louise’s response, we hope that all those that attendee UKSTAR can benefit in this way.

“attending a conference can add to a colleague’s personal development which can improve the way they work”

 

Presenting at UKSTAR 

First time speaker of UKSTAR Conference, Maryam Umar was “ECSTATIC” to be selected onto the 2019 programme! With over 13 years of experience in the software testing industry, her mentor finally gave her the push to submit to speak.  Maryam identifies and solves the main challenges faced in leadership in her talk at UKSTAR. She received amazing support and feedback from attendees of her talk. “We MUST continue to support our cause and make sure quality engineers and SDETs are a part of the team too!” Learn all about these challenges in her blog post.

 

 

First Time Conference Speaker 

Wayne Rutter, accomplished his first public speaking appearance on testing ever at UKSTAR 2019 (how awesome was he?!).  UKSTAR collaborated with Speak Easy to coach and guide Wayne in presenting at a conference for the first time. Wayne shares his journey to UKSTAR (literally!) and you can just feel the excitement of his story and his experience in this brilliant blog post.  He also attended the Lean Coffee (or tea in his case!) on Tuesday morning.

 

 

International Viewpoint 

We were super delighted to have Hristro Gergov part of the UKSTAR 2019 programme! Hristro hails from Bulgaria, and travelled all the way over to present his talk on Chatsbots. Hristo shares his experience on the Musala Soft company blog.

A Conference Convert

CTO of exhibiting company API Fortress, Simone Pezzanno shares his experience of the “booth life” and what is was like attending a conference for the first time. Simone shares how he has been converted into a “conference guy”. Read this very enjoyable and humorous blog post here to find out what exactly converted him to becoming a “conference guy”.

 

Confessions of a Huddler 

The ultimate king of volunteering, Chris Armstrong has been involved with helping out at EuroSTAR Conferences since 2017.  You’ll always find Chris at the Huddle, giving away prizes, organising Lean coffee, soap box sessions and managing the sticker table!  Discover the real confessions of what’s involved in being a Huddler! Chris explains the purpose of The Huddle, how he got involved, what he will change and of course, he has thrown in a few confessions!

If you would like to share your experience of UKSTAR 2019, be sure to tag us on social media platforms or send your blog to [email protected]

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