Gateway JUG

October 2011 Announcements

• Our next meeting will be October 4th at 6:00pm. Topic: "Change Anything with Cucumber and ATDD"
• Coming in November: Making JavaServer Faces Groovy
• Coming in December: Tool Tips
• We have partnered with the Gateway Groovy Users group to meet on our same night. The Gateway JUG meets from 6:00pm - 7:15pm. The Gateway Groovy User Group meeting will then follow from 7:30pm - 8:30pm. So come out for a healthy dose of Java, Groovy, and Grails starting at 6:00pm.
  
  • To RSVP for the Gateway JUG, please visit http://www.meetup.com/GatewayJUG/
  • To RSVP for the Gateway Groovy Users group, please visit http://www.meetup.com/GatewayGroovyUsers/

Wanted! Java Speakers ... We need a June speaker! If you have a favorite API, just learned a new tool or technique, or just want to share a design or development experience that will be informative and useful to other members, please send an e-mail to president{at}gatewayjug{dot}org to get on our presentation schedule.

Aurora Systems Group

 

Aurora Systems Group is a leading provider of information technology services and personnel based in St. Louis, Missouri. Our information technology services include: contract programming services; application systems development and maintenance, and custom software development. Through a comprehensive screening and hiring process, we only recruit the highest qualified IT personnel for our top-level clients.

For employees, we offer benefits you won’t find with other staffing groups. After all, when you have work security and additional benefits like healthcare, it allows you to focus on your skills and furthering your career. We consider ourselves to be an employer, not a broker, meaning that we take the financial and logistical responsibilities for maintaining a high quality, highly skilled staff of IT employees that are ready to go to work at a moment’s notice.  You get all of this and the opportunity to work at many of the best companies in St. Louis without having to change employers.

Our combined 50 years experience in the IT industry, and our desire to offer the best consultants and services to our customers,  and to treat all of our employees fairly has earned Aurora Systems Group the reputation as a leading and preferred IT consulting firm in the St. Louis area.

Oct 4 JUG Meeting: Change Anything with Cucumber and ATDD

 
Alright, so you’ve heard the TDD claim to fame.  Your code (…. Your functionality) is closely protected by an ever vigilant suite of tests ready to stop bugs before they are even introduced.  This sounds good, eh?

While TDD and unit testing provide numerous advantages in addition to protecting existing functionality, one shortcoming you may discover is that the scope of the unit test is too small.  Yeah, it tests how that individual class works,  but will it test the application as a whole?  Furthermore, will my unit test even be useful after a big change to the class structure?  Not likely.

Enter Acceptance Test Driven Development using Cucumber.  Test the whole application, nothing but the application, and only the application.  Allow yourself to be free to change big things and still have absolute confidence that your application still performs.  Furthermore, doing ATDD with Cucumber allows your tests to be in English (or Swedish if you like).

Whoa.  Tests in English!?  That sounds like a bad idea…  You have to see it to believe it.  It’s DRY and it’s awesome.  See you October 4^th.

Speaker: Mike Menne

Sponsor: Aurora Systems Group