We all are Automation Experts : Manual testers Vs Automation testers

The debate goes on. Who is the best? Manual or Automation? The article tries to explore the solution to a question that has existed for years.










Background:

I started my career as a Perl developer and Content writer. The good thing I learned from my early days is the importance of peer reviews. There was someone who always found fault in my shell scripts and I always had to rewrite some unimportant piece of my code. In a word, I hated this! The code was not ready yet, I told him or her.

So I improved myself not to make the same mistakes. 

Dive into Testing

I then started my career in manual testing and automating the scenarios. Frankly I found it boring to test the same things again and again.  Then I went into implementation team.

I always hear some manual testers complaining about automation team in forums/ blogs. Automation testers on the other hand labelled manual testers as dumb people as they don't have any knowledge about programming.

I asked myself, why this is the case?
The people who actually criticized the other group had no work. To justify their meager contribution to the overall quality of the product the other group resorted to the tactics of abasing the other team. This happens everywhere, accept it.

Also we are all Automation Experts. If you don't agree, let me enlighten you about things you have already automated:

1. You travel by a bus, car or a bike to work instead of walking
2. You set an alarm to wake yourself in the morning
3. You use Excel (my favorite automation tool)

Yes we all are automation experts, but most of us don't know it yet. I have seen some developers who know nothing and yet feel superior. I actually like to work with them because they can be easily manipulated to do what you want from them by fueling their Ego.



I am not an expert in anything. But I do manage to get things done irrespective of the tool, the scenario, the environment etc.
The only thing matters is "Yes I Can" (A quote derived from Obama's campaign :) ).

Manual or Automated : Remember to give your best to anything that is thrown at you. I have not given my best at few projects and trust me when I tell you, mistakes come back to haunt you.

As far as the question goes, it will exist for decades. Only a very good manual tester can make a very good automation tester because the qualities required for success are the same.