Fun with Code and TestApi

I took an opportunity to write some code last week. I’ll spare you the full background – short story is that the school my kids go to needed a small web app written. It ended up  being 100 lines or so of javascript and about 3 lines of html. The app works, and will save the school hour and hours of time (compared to their previous manual approach).

I was blown away by how much fun I had writing it. Although I try to stay sharp, I just don’t get to write much code these days.  It “only” took a few hours to write – it would have been quicker if I knew what I was doing - but it the learning was half the fun.I forgot how much fun it is to start with an idea and make it work. I realized that I really miss and think I better look for more opportunities soon just to keep myself sane.

Sadly, I don’t get to do much testing these days either, but I have been taking some time to play with TestApi (a library of test automation helpers on codeplex.com). TestApi releases incremental updates every few months, and is slowly turning into something quite useful. What I love about it most is that it’s super-lightweight. There’s no install – just put the files somewhere, add a reference to testapi, add a using statement or two, and you’re ready to go!

Now I just need to find something to test with it…maybe a web app some hack put together for my kids school would be a good bet.