What do people mean when they say "automation is a tool"?

24th March 2025
  • Locked
Emily O'Connor 's profile
Emily O'Connor

Principal Test Engineer

What do people mean when they say "automation is a tool"? image
A free account is required to view this content
Talk Description

In Emily O'Connor's first 404 talk, she discusses her understanding of the meaning of “automated testing is a tool”. 

When performing exploratory testing, testers learn a lot about the system under test, but by the time automation is written - testers are only putting into code fixed assertions, meaning that automation does not provide new knowledge and is used as a tool to save teams time searching for regression bugs.

Principal Test Engineer
I have a sixth sense for bugs, probably due to my experience as a dev (introducing them)! Principal Test Engineer and Playwright fan-girl.
Principal Test Engineer
I have a sixth sense for bugs, probably due to my experience as a dev (introducing them)! Principal Test Engineer and Playwright fan-girl.
More Talks
Round table: women in test Athens

0h 33m 4s

Discover the QA career path Athens

0h 7m 6s

From QA to Software Engineer in test: an accelerating journey Athens

0h 10m 22s

Subscribe to our newsletter
We'll keep you up to date on all the testing trends.