Super quick micro-review of StartTesting.net from @mikedoise. Note that I've only spent maybe an hour with it, so I may have missed features.
The Good: * I love the "accessibility issue" type, complete with WCAG sections right there, easy to search and attach * Has Jira fields like projects, milestones, features, etc. and is much more accessible and easier to use than Jira * creating pages/views, complete with associated URL, is really handy * Tailor (@tayarndt) is super quick finding and fixing issues; she fixed my problem within like 10 minutes
The bad: * I can't attach images; especially when doing accessibility reporting and testing, screenshots are a huge part of what clients expect in results * Similarly I can't attach log files or other traces to issues * no "blocks" or "is blocked by" to help link bugs/issues together; this is one of two things missing to make this a complete project management solution * no "due date", unless I missed it: this would be the other feature that completes start testing for project management
The nice to have: * report templates: I'd like to be able to set up a template, then export a project based on that template. This would make Start Testing a full solution for report generation * default issue type: It would be nice to change this. In some projects I would want "bug", but I'd rather "accessibility" in others
With a few months more work, and just a couple more features, I could easily see myself paying for this. Especially if I could export based on templates.
@fastfinge@mikedoise Thank you for taking the time to share this thoughtful review. I also really appreciate your kind words about how quickly I have responded to your feedback and fixed the issues you found. (1/4)
At Techopolis, we genuinely care about making Start Testing useful, accessible, and easy to work with. You are absolutely right that images and file attachments are important when documenting an issue. I am adding direct attachment support today. (2/4) @fastfinge@mikedoise
Start Testing already includes scheduling tools as well. You can create a milestone with its own start date and due date, connect individual issues to that milestone, and give each issue its own start and due date. This helps teams track both the larger delivery goal and the deadline for each piece of work. If those options were not easy to find, that is valuable feedback too. A feature is only useful when people can discover and understand it. (3/4) @fastfinge@mikedoise
Thank you again for trying Start Testing and helping me improve it. I care about the experience, I am listening, and I am continuing to build based on real feedback. I am also the founding developer on start testing, and thank you for believing (4/4) @fastfinge@mikedoise
@tayarndt@fastfinge@mikedoise I was looking at the pricing page and for Individual Pro $9 seems a little bit on the high side of the scale that someone would pay for something like this, maybe $7 or $8 at a push would be better, and for the Organization Starter plan, maybe $25 a month might be a bit more palatable. I'm just thinking since everyone's squeesed on the cost of things that those smaller differences would mean that more people would sign up.
@alexchapman@tayarndt@mikedoise It’s not high at all for the projects that pay me. If it feels high your under charging your clients. It is pricy enough I can’t consider it for my free open source work though. I’d love to see some sort of discount if I use it on a public repository and display the start testing logo. I can’t justify paying to use start testing if I’m working for free.
@fastfinge@alexchapman@mikedoise By the way, the attachment support you wanted and start testing is here as of this morning. I wanted to let you know and thank you for the feature. Also, one of your suggestions, the open source program I did take it and thank you for
@alexchapman@fastfinge@mikedoise I’m hoping that with our new price changes, we fixed it. Did you see our open source program three dollars a month or 30 a year? Let me know what you think about that, and if you’re interested in that, also attachments have been added for all the different types
@tayarndt@fastfinge@mikedoise Yup I saw that, that's awesome! I only just got round to responding as I was dealing with weird glitches on this desktop.
@tayarndt@mikedoise Ah! I didn’t explore milestones deeply enough. I’m used to setting dates directly on issues. My bad! I look forward to attachments! Once those are in I’ll grab a paid account so I can have multiple projects.
