Learnings at Everwell as Software Development Engineer in Test

I can clearly recall my first day at Everwell; a start up with a small team but a big mission — to have a lasting impact on global healthcare. Everwell grew quickly and with it, so did I. The work was challenging yet rewarding. I started working for a close-knit team that provided me the opportunity to take on various problems and to start new exploratory projects whenever I could. At Everwell, it truly felt like I gained 20 years worth of learning in just 2!

‘When I begin my day at work, I send a note to my manager that I will finish regression testing and send a report by the end of day; but post lunch, I send a status that the environment is down and database has crashed; however I will do my best.’

All jokes apart (well, for now), an SDET (Software Development Engineer in Test) role at Everwell involves not just testing the feature but also involves managing the production releases of multiple modules. A day as an SDET starts with verifying the Gitlab board and picking up tickets for production release. It involves the entire release cycle from requirement analysis, test case writing, both manual and automated testing, regular follow ups with different teams and stakeholders for the bugs, and finally doing production release.

What Do My Meetings Look Like?

‘The most important meeting is scrum where every student recites a poem in Shakespearean English. There are also those long planning meetings which could easily be email. You know the meetings with no conclusion and at the end someone sends a mail starting with “As discussed,…”. Well, that’s smart.’

I still remember the beginning of the pandemic where everyone had to start working remotely and could not meet in person. Working at Everwell gave me the best remote working experience. Most of the meetings were crisp and up to point.

Asking for Bug Fix

‘Let me explain the water cycle to you in simple terms. Liquid water evaporates into water vapor, condenses to form clouds, and precipitates back to earth in the form of rain, and boy, the cycle of a bug is no different! We ask a developer to fix one bug, the fix creates a new bug and the infinite loop continues!’

The bug fixing part would be slightly similar to what’s described about meetings. Even when everyone was working remotely, it was easy to connect to developers on google meet and slack. There were times when entire debugging used to happen on a call while remotely working and it was a wonderful experience for both the developers and the SDETs.

Running Automation Tests

‘Automation is so cool. Writing an automation test feels similar to Tony Stark trying to create a suit of armor around the world but ending up creating evil Ultron. Well not exactly, there is an alternate earth-838 where the Ultron program was successful. Automation is so cool that one day everything will be automated — be it requirement gathering, designing software, coding or production release.’

Everwell gave me the opportunity to implement a lot of ideas with respect to automation tests. At Everwell, all innovation and technical ideas were always embraced with open arms!

Production Deployment

‘We all enjoy the stress — including nail-biting bomb defusing scene in movies. You cut green wire, you save the day; you cut red one, you kill half the city. Production deployment is no different! Imagine there are 1000 wires of same color and cutting one wire would diffuse the bomb and remaining will destroy everything. Well, what could possibly go wrong!’

Here, at Everwell, production releases happen at frequent intervals. Deployment is not just sending a build into production. It involves multiple checks including smoke and sanity testing; automated and performance testing. At the end, all the released features are notified to respective stakeholders.

‘My friends often ask me- what does a SDET really do? 🤔 . D stands For Development and T stands for Testing. Now think about it — if someone can do both the roles at once, we are saving huge company costs. Hire one person to do the work of two.’

‘Now, give me a Nobel prize for solving a huge attrition problem!’

Everwell always strives for product excellence and sustainability. The company believes in dedication to end-user satisfaction and as SDET it is a really wonderful experience to work at Everwell.

In a nutshell, the last two years have been fantastic and fulfilling. I can say with certainty that working at Everwell has taught me a great deal. Making decisions and using my time wisely are two key skills that I’ve learnt are crucial for both me and my colleagues.

By: Ankit Agrawal (https://medium.com/@ankit-s-agrawal)