Welcome! This page supports the ATD tutorial https://agiletestingdays.com/2025/session/the-art-of-crafting-your-custom-tools/
Promise
AUDIENCE
Testers who want to support their testing with tools, or bin dull tasks by automation, and have fun
REQUIRED
laptop
KEY-LEARNINGS
- Automate to simplify test processes and access new ways of working.
- Defer dull and precise testing jobs to simple tools.
- Use existing tools, libraries and GEN-AI to build your own tools.
Build the Right Tool for Right Now
Efficient testing needs good tooling – and the right custom tools enable powerful, focussed test approaches. In this innovative workshop, you’ll combine common, accessible tools to build automation for your own testing tasks.
We’ll focus on testing-relevant work like comparing datasets, generating bulk data, wrangling environments, enhancing unit tests with custom matchers and exploring code with generated UIs. We’ll use spreadsheets, shell prompts, and LLMs to access simple automation that perfectly suits your teams’ needs.
After a grounding in the basics of building tools for tasks, our three experienced presenters will help you work together on custom tools. By the end of this interactive tutorial you will have the confidence and starting skills to work on your own toolset – and a handful of example tools that you’ve already built. Enhance your testing powers by making the right tool for your work.
Logistics
We'll run ?? - ??
Bring an internet connected device that you can type on
Bring a selection of tiny tool projects
Key thoughts
- Automate tasks not tests
- LLMs to make the tools, not to do the work
- Know capabilities to recognise opportunities
Sequence
Morning session
Tools to hand: Excel / notepad
OS tools: sort and grep
Afternoon session
GenAI tools: LLMs, agentic stuff
Gallery / share
For the 23rd (from the googledoc)
output of 23rd is minimum viable workshop
tools that we can build is part of MVP -> in a repo, in an devenv.
(shell and py and llm connect and a matcher and pytest and coverage)
we need an email to participants
we need a landing page (this, done)
we need some kind of intro, feedback cycle, wrapup
how are the people going to work 2-3 and reshuffle
JL will bring some tiny tools that have been made and are useful – checkRefs and summarise History
JL will bring a piece about orchestrating with an LLM inc prompts
BK find out how macros work in sheets
HS will bring prompt template