Robin Anderson: Red Gate graduate

Employer: Red Gate Software
University: University of Reading
Subject: MEng electronic engineering and computer science
Graduated: 2008

I knew I wanted a career in which I could use my programming skills. I did a six-month placement during my degree as a hardware verification engineer for a semiconductor company, which involved writing software to test the company’s hardware. I returned for a further six months after graduating before joining my current employer.

My job: breaking software

My company writes software to make the lives of database administrators and .NET developers easier. My role is to try to break the software we create to ensure that it is of as high a quality as possible.

The majority of this is formal testing, which involves analysing each feature of a package individually, working out how to test it and writing software that will do this automatically. There’s also an element of ‘monkey testing’, using applications in a vigorous or unintended fashion to see how they cope.

The product I’m currently working on is SQL Response, a server monitoring tool that keeps an eye on a company’s servers, alerting the administrator if there is a problem and helping identify the cause.

My team of software testers and developers

I’m part of a team of three testers and five developers based in an open-plan office. I work individually but it’s a huge help having the developers here so we can discuss things.

I have occasional client contact: our support team sometimes escalates complex software problems up to me, which tends to involve e-mail interaction with clients; from time to time database administrators visit our offices; and I’ve visited a client to see how it uses our software.

I work from 8.00 am or 9.00 am to 5.00 pm or 6.00 pm, occasionally staying later.

Training on Microsoft SQL Server

I’ve learned a lot on the job through working with knowledgeable colleagues. I’ve also done a couple of courses with an external trainer on Microsoft SQL Server, which I use a lot.

Apart from programming ability, the main skill I need is lateral thinking: a developer will never be able to think of everything when he or she writes a program, so I consider potential issues that might have been missed.

Writing my own software tool

I love the fact that I have licence to do my job as I want to and that I’m always learning new things – I spend a lot of time doing online research.

I’m particularly proud of having written a software tool that other testers in the company now use. It can remotely manipulate and monitor multiple test computers to allow testers to put them into otherwise hard to produce conditions – for example little free disk space – to see how our software copes under such circumstances.