Erik Petersen

Erik Petersen is a consultant based in Melbourne, Australia. Erik has helped build software systems across applications, telecommunications, and infrastructure for more than twenty years. He's unwittingly become an encyclopedia of software and test process and management, strategy, automation, and tools. Contact him at [email protected].

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All Stories by Erik Petersen

The Bugs They Wouldn't Fix Are Breaking the Internet

Zero-day bugs or exploits remain very common, and nearly every major vendor has reported them at various times. Because of security vulnerabilities, we are seeing a thriving black market for bugs, competitions to discover new exploits, and a growing need for security testing.

The Attack of the Copyright Enforcement Robots

Filtering of copyright material has been common in text, but it is now extending to video. In addition to issues determining when reuse is acceptable, there are major issues determining the real owners of material. A whole new class of bugs is emerging from this—and the need for new laws!

Reinventing (and Testing) the Parking Meter

Nearly eighty years ago, streetscapes of cities and towns started changing as a new technology was adopted, with the introduction of parking meters in Oklahoma. Many of these are now being upgraded in various ways, with varying levels of success, and with many variations in business rules.

Curiosity—and Its Software—on Tour of Mars

The Mars rover Curiosity reached its destination earlier this month after years of planning, months of travel through space, and some very careful landing maneuvers. At the heart of Curiosity is some very complex software. If you think testing in production is hard, try testing all the way to Mars.

The Wisdom of Crowds

The "wisdom of crowds," or crowdsourced testing, can be a powerful tool if harnessed correctly. It also can backfire when tweaking user-facing functionality in a live environment, as a couple of big-name companies discovered. Tread carefully!

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