I still find system tests useful and more realistic, despite their speed. They’ve caught bigger, breaking changes for me than unit or controller tests.
Good read, but the abrupt end surprised me. It didn't dive deeper into the solution to evaluate whether it actually addressed the observed issue.
Also, isn't the accessibility of radio buttons for keyboard users something you simply learn? <Tab> isn't the panacea of getting around a web page with a keyboard. I think of <Tab> as navigating interactive elements by default, but within those elements the arrow keys allow more granularity. Several instances of that behavior, including radio buttons, shown here: https://webaim.org/techniques/keyboard/#testing
Yes, but it depends on where you submit. I've seen literary journals pay in contributor copies (aka nothing), token amounts—a few dollars, a rate per page, or a fixed rate up front. Genres like sci-fi, fantasy, horror, and crime or mystery are more likely to pay per word. Not sure why that is.
Congrats to superamit! Well done with your persistence and I hope Uncanny is receptive to your future submissions. I'm excited to read the story.
Disclaimer: light self-promo. Are others interested in more publishing posts like these? I've documented the journey to publication stories with stats, rejections, and a sense of the work involved for most of the short fiction I've published in literary journals. It's been cathartic and encouraging to share the entire process.
My most notable piece[1] ended up making it into The Best American Mystery Stories[2] a few years ago.
I've been tinkering with something similar too. This is for timing checklists not individual items—so typically multiple steps that repeat from time to time: https://tusklist.com
It's more that software is already so unpredictable. A 90% confidence estimate for a task might be 4 hours to 4 months. That's not very useful. Counting routine work would increase accuracy to something like 2 days to 4 months.
I'm not sure if it's better, but we can make some plans around that. The extra control is a little comforting. And it's less demoralising when it's not done by the end of the day.
I like doing it because I can see how much time it takes to fit in my day, since I usually time block my day. It might be routine so I can estimate the time but if I have a lot of tasks, I might over or underestimate and not get everything done that I'd want to.
Has anyone else applied product or agile techniques to creative endeavors? Thinking about retro made me wonder whether doing a regular standup with my writing could lead to new insights, akin to freewriting or journaling.
I find conceptual work is sending me back to paper and lower fidelity even more these days with AI. The fundamentals thrive with more freeform tools.