Life is good for 2012 – What I’ve been up to so far.

This is just going to be an update to what I’ve been doing so far and why my blog has been a bit quiet. I will get back on the testing side of things.

And relax…

I’ve got myself a new job. It’s an exciting time as my new title will be QA Engineer. Finally I’m an engineer. *smile*. I wonder if my partial aerospace engineering knowledge will be put to good use. I doubt it as I’m going to a web hosting company.

So what have I been doing to prepare. Well I started to research things about the tech that I will be using. I downloaded XAMPP and installed their tech management system and their bug tracker. That was interesting as I’ve never installed a LAMP stack before so trying to figure out PHP, config.inc files and why I couldn’t connect to the database was enlightening.

I’ve also been reading several technical books on various concepts such as

TCP/IP – Reading books like Learn TCP/IP in 24 hours

Browsing Security Sites (It may be an option in my new job) – If it is, this is one of the many avenues that I might want to head towards). – Sites include Ethical Hackers, InterN0t. I’m looking at certs such as E-LearnSecurity – Penetration Testing. I’m just trying to soak up as much information. Has anyone taken Security certs?

Reading various security books – Hacking for Dummies, Web Application Hacking cookbook.

I know that I was learning Ruby, but since this new job concentrates on Python, I’ve installed it to my shiny new notebook and will be going through examples. The same with SQL and PHP. I’ll no doubt learn more on the job.

I’m also trying to take in information about how networks and servers work, the idea of learning all the domain knowledge is making me buzz with excitement. I’m looking into the CCNA books and see what I can learn from them. Libraries are wonderous places.

Talking about my new netbook, I plan to do a dual boot of Linux and Win 7 so that I can learn the linux side of things. Learning Linux will help me greatly if I do want to go down the security side of Testing.

Continuing to learn about Testing techniques  as it is always interesting to learn new techniques and concepts.

There are times when I’m tired but I think it’ll be worth it as it is great to be learning all this knowledge and still be buzzed about it. It’s a great time.

One of the things I want to do before I start is to create a mind map of what I want to achieve/my objectives for the future. I can then present this to my team leader and see what objectives match up. Hopefully, it will show that I’m engaged and have a clear idea of what I want my future in testing to consist of.

Now all of the above isn’t connected to my new job but I’m enjoying the learning process so it’s good to keep the ball rolling. I just have to have a nice balance so that I do not burn myself out.

Of course, I’m still enjoying time with the family.

P.S – I’m still working on my decision tree – 20 question program. It’ll just have to be in Python.