QA’ing website builds is not an easy task. There are countless issues to check and comments to wrangle. From copywriting, to <TITLE> tags, to image exports, to functionality. Depending on the site, there is a lot that can — and will — go wrong during testing.
It’s a fact of life that there will be several rounds of QA before a site is ready to launch. And usually post-launch has its own batch of issues to take care of.
With that in mind, I’ve QA’ed sites a variety of ways — Excel spreadsheets, Word documents, shared Google Docs, Adobe PDF — and it usually becomes very complicated and difficult to manage.
As a producer, the scale usually tilted after a day or so of QA in which I started managing the QA documentation more than the actual QA project. Notice how I used the past-tense in the preceding sentence.
Enter Notable.
This website makes QA actually enjoyable. Some features I love:
- The Firefox add-on makes taking screen grabs one-click and then they’re ready to add to your Notable account (you can also upload screen grabs on your own)
- Not only does the Notable add-on take screen grabs, it imports all the code from the site you’re QA’ing.
This means you can click on the “code” tab and comment directly on the JS, HTML, CSS, etc. Unbelievable (also has options for SEO, copy, etc.) - Export all of your comments to PDF — basically this export is a better looking, easier-to-manage and more comprehensive version of the offline tools I had used in the passed
- It’s cheap — I’m currently on the Basic Plan — and will immediately improve your efficiency and save you time (which is, after all, money)
There are a ton of great productivity web apps on the market for producers, designer and developers. Just like Basecamp, Harvest, and Campaign Monitor — using Notable makes my life not only easier, but actually a little bit better.
Give it a try. You’ll love Notable.
Finding typos in my emials
I’ve got this weird compulsion when I send emails—I often re-read them after they’re sent. Do you ever do that? Well, this compulsion is also self-inflicted pain because I instantly notice my poor grammar and typos—and often times, they are many.
Not only are poorly-written emails confusing, they lessen the perception of professionalism.
But you know what?—I’ll never slow myself down to proof-read emails nor will I let myself worry too much about my errors.
Despite the mispellings or occasional unclear sentence, speed is one of my assets.
My buddies and I were goofing around with Typing Test last week. I found out I type at 87 words-per-minute. (My friend, who’s an accountant, scored highest with 88 WPM, nerdball.) Besides being wildly entertaining, the typing test reinforced that I am able to really pump out communications.
I pride myself on responding quickly to my clients and colleagues. I relish shooting off call reports as quickly as I can. When producing and developing projects, it’s important to keep moving. Faced with a crossroads, I make an effort to take an action—send the email, post the file, set the milestone, make the phone call—lingering on perfection doesn’t work.
Just like new business versus old business—you’ll always get more mileage exercising your current strengths than trying to improve your weaknesses.
For me, one of my strengths is doing regardless of a few imperfections from time-to-time. And at times I end up with typos in my emials, c’est la vie.
So, what are your strengths? Where do you find yourself excelling?