System Testing

I've done small test programs with a command for each key function on a single page with feedback locked with a "clear last" and "Clear All" button. On site the installers can work through and see where they've got to or clear and start again.

For larger jobs I try to schedule a time with the installers as a handover, where we check everything is correct for me to implement. This often depends on whether the hardware has been in the workshop first tho.

We have an engineer on staff who reads/writes/executes both amx and its major competitor. She has her own jobs, but she also performs QC on every other job done within the company. She has an install tech permanently assigned to her and they go out to jobs after the installers and before the engineers.

It works very well because she has an extreme attention to detail. She loads code to the master and tests every control port as well as making sure she can see every video source on every display and hear every audio source through every speaker. It means that by the time the programmer/engineer get out on site, we know everything works and just needs to be configured.

I'm convinced that on jobs where this whole process works, we work MUCH more efficiently, and things go much faster, and the client gets a better system in the end. We're still working out kinks in the system, but its great to know that when I go out to a site, it all . . . works.

J

I've created some "installer pages" for projector setup and such, but nothing for functionality testing. Generally a particular device either works 0% or 100%, and that's generally due to wiring or baud rate issues. I frequently have a page that indicates the status of each device with 2-way feedback so installers don't call me and tell me the projector doesn't work before they actually get it wired and talking.

jweather wrote: »

I've created some "installer pages" for projector setup and such, but nothing for functionality testing. Generally a particular device either works 0% or 100%, and that's generally due to wiring or baud rate issues.

I guess it depends on whether you are responsible for just the control system or the whole install - generally I have to act as the commissioning / handover engineer and so I have to ensure that the whole system operates correctly. The installers should test everything, but sometimes with big matrix switchers or distro systems you need to give them a tool to help - then your job on-site is much easier...

fogled@mizzou wrote: »

Unfortunately, I'm the programmer AND the install tester/QA/cleanup guy. I rarely get to put the system together in the shop and test it first (and boy am I jealous of an organization that really does this!). It's amazing how often I have to fire up the solder gun and swap pins 2-3 on serial devices, finish wiring myself, or worse, reverse-engineer an off-schematic wiring job. Not that anyone will actually help me do design or UI reviews in the first place.

If anyone would like a case study on how NOT to do things, please come visit me in the EDU department. We seem to have the knack for doing a lousy job in the poorest, most inefficient way conceivable. I'd send a few pics of recent installs, but I'm really, truly embarrassed...

while I was at Nebraska University, there was the 'right' way, the 'wrong' way and the 'UNL' way. Large institutions are not bastiens of efficiency... That's for sure.

Now I work for a company with 25 or so people. We do things entirely differently. We have no organization and everyone wears 50 hats. I sometimes find myself longing for the comfort of 4 very strict walls around me.

I thinks it's the human condition. the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.

We are making modules for projectors, conference systems and camera control.

In most cases we have to adjust the RS-232 commands to get the module working. So the code that we use in the main program is almost the same as any other program.

So, we only have to test the module if all the function's are working and adjust it where it must

Further I only go to a location if the software must be fine-tuned or if there a problems.