src/content/community/articles/interviews/netcat6-spotlight.html - netbeans-website-cleanup - Git at Google

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 <h1>NetCAT 6.0 Top Cats - Jacek Laskowski &amp; Anuradha Gunasekara<br>
 </h1>
 <span style="font-style: italic;">January 2008</span><br>
 <img alt="NetCAT 6.0 Logo" src="../../../images_www/logos/netcat6-logo.png"
  style="width: 118px; height: 89px;" align="left" hspace="5" vspace="5"><br>
 As an open source project, NetBeans places a premium on community
 involvement and feedback. Look no further than the
 recent NetBeans 6.0 release for evidence of this. NetBeans users were
 at the
 forefront of the <a
  href="https://netbeans.org/servlets/NewsItemView?newsItemID=1157">call</a>
 to take the release candidate builds of the IDE
 into FCS status.<br>
 <br>
 NetBeans offers more than a half-dozen ways for users to take an active
 role in shaping the direction of the project. One such avenue is
 <a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/index.html">NetCAT</a>,
 the NetBeans Community Acceptance Testing program, which gives
 a selected group of active NetBeans users the opportunity to get
 involved in the quality assurance testing of Beta and RC builds of the
 IDE. <br>
 <br>
 Get an overview of NetCAT in this talk with Program Coordinator
 Jirka Kovalsky, in which he also spotlights two top members of the
 recent NetCAT 6.0 team and reveals what interested NetBeans users will
 want to know about taking part in future NetCAT cycles.<br>
 <br>
 <h5><img alt="Jirka Kovalsky"
  src="../../../images_www/articles/interviews/netcat6-jirka.png"
  style="width: 122px; height: 170px;" align="left" hspace="5" vspace="5">What
 is your role as the NetCAT
 coordinator?</h5>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">My primary tasks include sending out
 NetCAT invitation notices, communicating with applicants and
 coordinating the selection process. Once a cycle begins, I monitor
 traffic on the NetCAT mailing list, moderate “hot” discussions,
 answer or forward questions to NetBeans engineers, and organize
 surveys for features that are being tested, such as the Editor,
 Woodstock components, etc.</p>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">It is a challenging but interesting
 role. I have to make sure that all participants feel valued and
 motivated, but sometimes I'm the bearer of bad news. For example,
 someone reports a nasty P2 bug but we decide against a fix because
 it's dangerous or there is too little time. On the other hand, I
 enjoy the fact that 60 people located in various time zones, from
 different cultures, work together and share the same goal. It's very
 encouraging to feel their passion, watch their lively discussions and
 see their contributions. It's an eye-opening experience.<br>
 </p>
 <h5>Despite
 the cool logo, NetCAT has nothing to do with felines. How well does the
 NetBeans community get the function of NetCAT?<br>
 </h5>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">I think NetCAT participants in general
 understand
 the role of the program very well, and have the right set of
 expectations. Still, I sometimes find myself having to emphasize that
 NetCAT is only about quality and <span style="font-style: italic;">not</span>
 about feature
 design. On a lighter note, I've had individuals mistake the project for
 the
 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netcat"><code>netcat</code></a>
 Unix utility.
 </p>
 <h5>How are participants selected? </h5>
 <div
  style="padding: 10pt 10pt 10px 10px; background-color: rgb(173, 216, 230); width: 150px; float: right; font-size: 100%;">
 <div style="font-weight: bold; text-align: center;">NetCAT 6.0 Stats<br>
 </div>
 <div style="text-align: center;"><br>
 </div>
 <div style="font-size: 90%;">
 <div style="text-align: center;">Team Members: 60<br>
 <br>
 Bugs Reported: 660<br>
 <br>
 Emails Exchanged: 2700<br>
 <br>
 Surveys Completed: 5<br>
 <br>
 RFEs: 123<br>
 <br>
 Length of Cycle: 91 Days<br>
 </div>
 </div>
 </div>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Interested participants submit
 their application online and provide us with their personal and
 professional information, and testing environment—this means what
 operating systems
 they
 can use for testing, which JDKs they have installed, etc. All
 applicants
 are evaluated and assigned
 points. For example, four or more years of experience using the
 NetBeans IDE translates into 0.6 points; having eight hours per week
 to volunteer for NetCAT is worth 0.6 points; experience with
 Issuezilla earns an applicant 0.5 points; and so on. Points can be
 deducted as well. For example, no Version Control System usage is a
 -0.1 point loss.<span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></p>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Several NetBeans engineers are involved
 in the review process also. They select their 10 favorite applicants,
 which means the applicants get 1 point for each such preference. The
 points are tallied up and all applicants are compared. The best 60
 applicants and 30 substitutes are selected.</p>
 <h5>Tell us about the two NetCAT 6.0 members—Jacek Laskowski and
 Anuradha Gunasekara—that you've singled out for
 recognition.</h5>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Jacek
 Laskowski is a Polish developer
 and a NetCAT veteran (he participated in the 5.0 cycle). His areas of
 focus are J2EE and Web Services, and his work on NetCAT 6.0 earned
 him the award of “Most Helpful Member”. Anuradha Gunasekara is a
 developer from Colombo, Sri Lanka. He concentrated on Life Cycle tools
 and SOA functionality in the project; he is the runner-up in the
 “Most Agile Member” category.<br>
 </p>
 <div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Jacek Laskowski"
  src="../../../images_www/articles/interviews/netcat6-jacek.jpg"
  style="height: 154px; width: 113px;" hspace="5" vspace="5">&nbsp;<img
  style="width: 169px; height: 152px;" alt="Anuradha Gunasekara"
  src="../../../images_www/articles/interviews/netcat6-anuradha.jpg"
  hspace="5" vspace="5"><br>
 </div>
 <h5>"Most Helpful, Most Agile"? Explain these distinctions.</h5>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">I monitor the activity of all NetCAT
 participants, and everyone earns CAT points for his or her various
 tasks—two points for RFEs, four points for bug reports, five to ten
 points for participating in surveys, etc. The person with the most
 points is recognized as the “Most Helpful”.</p>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Jacek, for example, was our best bug
 reporter, submitting an astonishing 82 bugs and 12 RFEs (Request For
 Enhancement). He participated in 4 surveys and gave excellent reviews
 of documentation for Enterprise applications and Web Services, to
 name a few. His P1 issue (<a
  href="https://netbeans.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=122228">#122228</a>)
 about inconsistency on method removal in the Web Services Designer was
 accepted as RC1 show stopper and fixed in RC2.<span
  style="font-weight: bold;"></span>
 </p>
 <div
  style="padding: 10pt 10pt 10px 10px; background-color: rgb(173, 216, 230); width: 150px; float: right; font-size: 100%;">
 <div style="font-weight: bold; text-align: center;">NetCAT 6.0 Top Cats<br>
 </div>
 <div style="text-align: center;"><br>
 <span style="text-decoration: underline;">Most Helpful Members</span><br>
 </div>
 <div style="font-size: 90%;">
 <div style="text-align: center;"><br>
 Jacek Laskowski<br>
 Daniel Sheppard<br>
 Tetsu Soh<br>
 <br>
 <span style="text-decoration: underline;">Most Agile Members</span><br>
 <br>
 Jacek Laskowski<br>
 Anuradha Gunasekara<br>
 Daniel Sheppard<br>
 </div>
 </div>
 </div>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">The “Most Agile” category is a new
 one for NetCAT. Sometimes inactive members are replaced by
 substitutes who have little chance of being considered the “Most
 Helpful” grade because they've joined a cycle already in progress.
 To acknowledge these substitutes, some of whom become as active as
 the top participants, I introduced this category, which takes the
 total number of earned CAT points and divides it by the number of
 days involved in NetCAT. This way, a member with 50 points but less
 days on the project could technically be considered more active than
 one who started on track with NetCAT and has 90 points.</p>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Jacek
 had the most points in the “Most
 Agile”category as well, but I have singled out Anuradha, the runner-up,
 for the reasons I just described.</p>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Despite joining NetCAT 6.0 midway
 through, Anuradha was an excellent participant, sometimes working
 even faster than our engineers! He is familiar with NetBeans APIs and
 his speed was a definite benefit for us. He
 reported 26 bugs and 3 RFEs, took surveys and on two occasions fixed
 major bugs by himself. But NetCAT isn't only Anuradha's contribution
 to the NetBeans community; he also has three plugins in the Plugin
 Portal
 and succeeded in getting two of them into our Update Center.<span
  style="font-weight: bold;"></span></p>
 <h5>What's the average length of a NetCAT
 cycle?</h5>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">NetCAT usually takes about two to four
 months, starting with Beta and ending with the RC1 build.<br>
 </p>
 <h5>And the characteristics of a good
 NetCAT cycle? </h5>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">The ideal NetCAT cycle is one with very
 active participants till the very end. The team members believe in
 and are invested in the success of the product because of the effort
 they've contributed. This is also good because they usually promote
 the IDE to their friends, colleagues, etc. I for one consider NetCAT
 6.0 to be the best NetCAT program ever.</p>
 <h5>What stood out in NetCAT 6.0?</h5>
 <p>NetCAT 6.0 was different in several aspects. First, we opened
 the final <a
  href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/results/ca_results.html">
 Community Acceptance survey</a> to the whole NetBeans community.
 Second,
 we introduced a replacement of inactive participants; perhaps this is
 why team feedback
 was good till the end.
 </p>
 <h5>When is the next round of NetCAT?</h5>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">This is still to be determined.
 NetBeans 6.1 will not have a NetCAT cycle because it will be a bug
 fix release without many new features.</p>
 <h5>Besides helping to release a great product, what else can people
 expect from
 taking part in NetCAT?</h5>
 <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
 NetCAT is a unique chance for participants to improve their knowledge
 of
 NetBeans
 by learning from others; and of course, friendships are created. People
 also
 get special prizes, such as limited edition
 <a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/images/pen.png">pens</a>
 and <a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/images/tshirt.jpg">t-shirts</a>
 or free vouchers towards the <a
  href="http://www.cafeshops.com/netbeans">NetBeans
 Shop</a>.
 And finally, it's an excellent addition for their CVs!
 </p>
 <h5>Thank you Jirka for the interview and
 for spotlighting Jacek and Anuradha.</h5>
 <br>
 <h2>Additional Links</h2>
 <br>
 <a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/participants.html">NetCAT
 6.0 Team Members</a><br>
 <br>
 NetCAT <a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/faqs.html">FAQs</a>
 &amp; <a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/etiquette.html">Etiquette</a><br>
 <br>
 Jirka Kovalsky Discusses NetCAT 6.0 on <a
  href="http://blogs.sun.com/roumen/entry/netbeans_podcast_episode_37">NetBeans
 Podcast Episode 37</a><br>
 <br>
 </body>
 </html>
	<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
	<html>
	<head>
	<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
	<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="../../../netbeans.css" media="screen">
	<meta name="author" content="Tinuola Awopetu">
	<meta name="keywords" content="NetBeans IDE, NetCAT, Jirka Kovalsky, Jacek Laskowski, Anuradha Gunasekara">
	<title>NetCAT 6.0 Top Cats - Jacek Laskowski & Anuradha Gunasekara</title>
	</head>
	<body>
	<h1>NetCAT 6.0 Top Cats - Jacek Laskowski & Anuradha Gunasekara<br>
	</h1>
	<span style="font-style: italic;">January 2008</span><br>
	<img alt="NetCAT 6.0 Logo" src="../../../images_www/logos/netcat6-logo.png"
	style="width: 118px; height: 89px;" align="left" hspace="5" vspace="5"><br>
	As an open source project, NetBeans places a premium on community
	involvement and feedback. Look no further than the
	recent NetBeans 6.0 release for evidence of this. NetBeans users were
	at the
	forefront of the <a
	href="https://netbeans.org/servlets/NewsItemView?newsItemID=1157">call</a>
	to take the release candidate builds of the IDE
	into FCS status.<br>
	<br>
	NetBeans offers more than a half-dozen ways for users to take an active
	role in shaping the direction of the project. One such avenue is
	<a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/index.html">NetCAT</a>,
	the NetBeans Community Acceptance Testing program, which gives
	a selected group of active NetBeans users the opportunity to get
	involved in the quality assurance testing of Beta and RC builds of the
	IDE. <br>
	<br>
	Get an overview of NetCAT in this talk with Program Coordinator
	Jirka Kovalsky, in which he also spotlights two top members of the
	recent NetCAT 6.0 team and reveals what interested NetBeans users will
	want to know about taking part in future NetCAT cycles.<br>
	<br>
	<h5><img alt="Jirka Kovalsky"
	src="../../../images_www/articles/interviews/netcat6-jirka.png"
	style="width: 122px; height: 170px;" align="left" hspace="5" vspace="5">What
	is your role as the NetCAT
	coordinator?</h5>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">My primary tasks include sending out
	NetCAT invitation notices, communicating with applicants and
	coordinating the selection process. Once a cycle begins, I monitor
	traffic on the NetCAT mailing list, moderate “hot” discussions,
	answer or forward questions to NetBeans engineers, and organize
	surveys for features that are being tested, such as the Editor,
	Woodstock components, etc.</p>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">It is a challenging but interesting
	role. I have to make sure that all participants feel valued and
	motivated, but sometimes I'm the bearer of bad news. For example,
	someone reports a nasty P2 bug but we decide against a fix because
	it's dangerous or there is too little time. On the other hand, I
	enjoy the fact that 60 people located in various time zones, from
	different cultures, work together and share the same goal. It's very
	encouraging to feel their passion, watch their lively discussions and
	see their contributions. It's an eye-opening experience.<br>
	</p>
	<h5>Despite
	the cool logo, NetCAT has nothing to do with felines. How well does the
	NetBeans community get the function of NetCAT?<br>
	</h5>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">I think NetCAT participants in general
	understand
	the role of the program very well, and have the right set of
	expectations. Still, I sometimes find myself having to emphasize that
	NetCAT is only about quality and <span style="font-style: italic;">not</span>
	about feature
	design. On a lighter note, I've had individuals mistake the project for
	the
	<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netcat"><code>netcat</code></a>
	Unix utility.
	</p>
	<h5>How are participants selected? </h5>
	<div
	style="padding: 10pt 10pt 10px 10px; background-color: rgb(173, 216, 230); width: 150px; float: right; font-size: 100%;">
	<div style="font-weight: bold; text-align: center;">NetCAT 6.0 Stats<br>
	</div>
	<div style="text-align: center;"><br>
	</div>
	<div style="font-size: 90%;">
	<div style="text-align: center;">Team Members: 60<br>
	<br>
	Bugs Reported: 660<br>
	<br>
	Emails Exchanged: 2700<br>
	<br>
	Surveys Completed: 5<br>
	<br>
	RFEs: 123<br>
	<br>
	Length of Cycle: 91 Days<br>
	</div>
	</div>
	</div>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Interested participants submit
	their application online and provide us with their personal and
	professional information, and testing environment—this means what
	operating systems
	they
	can use for testing, which JDKs they have installed, etc. All
	applicants
	are evaluated and assigned
	points. For example, four or more years of experience using the
	NetBeans IDE translates into 0.6 points; having eight hours per week
	to volunteer for NetCAT is worth 0.6 points; experience with
	Issuezilla earns an applicant 0.5 points; and so on. Points can be
	deducted as well. For example, no Version Control System usage is a
	-0.1 point loss.<span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></p>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Several NetBeans engineers are involved
	in the review process also. They select their 10 favorite applicants,
	which means the applicants get 1 point for each such preference. The
	points are tallied up and all applicants are compared. The best 60
	applicants and 30 substitutes are selected.</p>
	<h5>Tell us about the two NetCAT 6.0 members—Jacek Laskowski and
	Anuradha Gunasekara—that you've singled out for
	recognition.</h5>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Jacek
	Laskowski is a Polish developer
	and a NetCAT veteran (he participated in the 5.0 cycle). His areas of
	focus are J2EE and Web Services, and his work on NetCAT 6.0 earned
	him the award of “Most Helpful Member”. Anuradha Gunasekara is a
	developer from Colombo, Sri Lanka. He concentrated on Life Cycle tools
	and SOA functionality in the project; he is the runner-up in the
	“Most Agile Member” category.<br>
	</p>
	<div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Jacek Laskowski"
	src="../../../images_www/articles/interviews/netcat6-jacek.jpg"
	style="height: 154px; width: 113px;" hspace="5" vspace="5"> <img
	style="width: 169px; height: 152px;" alt="Anuradha Gunasekara"
	src="../../../images_www/articles/interviews/netcat6-anuradha.jpg"
	hspace="5" vspace="5"><br>
	</div>
	<h5>"Most Helpful, Most Agile"? Explain these distinctions.</h5>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">I monitor the activity of all NetCAT
	participants, and everyone earns CAT points for his or her various
	tasks—two points for RFEs, four points for bug reports, five to ten
	points for participating in surveys, etc. The person with the most
	points is recognized as the “Most Helpful”.</p>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Jacek, for example, was our best bug
	reporter, submitting an astonishing 82 bugs and 12 RFEs (Request For
	Enhancement). He participated in 4 surveys and gave excellent reviews
	of documentation for Enterprise applications and Web Services, to
	name a few. His P1 issue (<a
	href="https://netbeans.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=122228">#122228</a>)
	about inconsistency on method removal in the Web Services Designer was
	accepted as RC1 show stopper and fixed in RC2.<span
	style="font-weight: bold;"></span>
	</p>
	<div
	style="padding: 10pt 10pt 10px 10px; background-color: rgb(173, 216, 230); width: 150px; float: right; font-size: 100%;">
	<div style="font-weight: bold; text-align: center;">NetCAT 6.0 Top Cats<br>
	</div>
	<div style="text-align: center;"><br>
	<span style="text-decoration: underline;">Most Helpful Members</span><br>
	</div>
	<div style="font-size: 90%;">
	<div style="text-align: center;"><br>
	Jacek Laskowski<br>
	Daniel Sheppard<br>
	Tetsu Soh<br>
	<br>
	<span style="text-decoration: underline;">Most Agile Members</span><br>
	<br>
	Jacek Laskowski<br>
	Anuradha Gunasekara<br>
	Daniel Sheppard<br>
	</div>
	</div>
	</div>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">The “Most Agile” category is a new
	one for NetCAT. Sometimes inactive members are replaced by
	substitutes who have little chance of being considered the “Most
	Helpful” grade because they've joined a cycle already in progress.
	To acknowledge these substitutes, some of whom become as active as
	the top participants, I introduced this category, which takes the
	total number of earned CAT points and divides it by the number of
	days involved in NetCAT. This way, a member with 50 points but less
	days on the project could technically be considered more active than
	one who started on track with NetCAT and has 90 points.</p>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Jacek
	had the most points in the “Most
	Agile”category as well, but I have singled out Anuradha, the runner-up,
	for the reasons I just described.</p>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Despite joining NetCAT 6.0 midway
	through, Anuradha was an excellent participant, sometimes working
	even faster than our engineers! He is familiar with NetBeans APIs and
	his speed was a definite benefit for us. He
	reported 26 bugs and 3 RFEs, took surveys and on two occasions fixed
	major bugs by himself. But NetCAT isn't only Anuradha's contribution
	to the NetBeans community; he also has three plugins in the Plugin
	Portal
	and succeeded in getting two of them into our Update Center.<span
	style="font-weight: bold;"></span></p>
	<h5>What's the average length of a NetCAT
	cycle?</h5>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">NetCAT usually takes about two to four
	months, starting with Beta and ending with the RC1 build.<br>
	</p>
	<h5>And the characteristics of a good
	NetCAT cycle? </h5>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">The ideal NetCAT cycle is one with very
	active participants till the very end. The team members believe in
	and are invested in the success of the product because of the effort
	they've contributed. This is also good because they usually promote
	the IDE to their friends, colleagues, etc. I for one consider NetCAT
	6.0 to be the best NetCAT program ever.</p>
	<h5>What stood out in NetCAT 6.0?</h5>
	<p>NetCAT 6.0 was different in several aspects. First, we opened
	the final <a
	href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/results/ca_results.html">
	Community Acceptance survey</a> to the whole NetBeans community.
	Second,
	we introduced a replacement of inactive participants; perhaps this is
	why team feedback
	was good till the end.
	</p>
	<h5>When is the next round of NetCAT?</h5>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">This is still to be determined.
	NetBeans 6.1 will not have a NetCAT cycle because it will be a bug
	fix release without many new features.</p>
	<h5>Besides helping to release a great product, what else can people
	expect from
	taking part in NetCAT?</h5>
	<p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
	NetCAT is a unique chance for participants to improve their knowledge
	of
	NetBeans
	by learning from others; and of course, friendships are created. People
	also
	get special prizes, such as limited edition
	<a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/images/pen.png">pens</a>
	and <a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/images/tshirt.jpg">t-shirts</a>
	or free vouchers towards the <a
	href="http://www.cafeshops.com/netbeans">NetBeans
	Shop</a>.
	And finally, it's an excellent addition for their CVs!
	</p>
	<h5>Thank you Jirka for the interview and
	for spotlighting Jacek and Anuradha.</h5>
	<br>
	<h2>Additional Links</h2>
	<br>
	<a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/participants.html">NetCAT
	6.0 Team Members</a><br>
	<br>
	NetCAT <a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/faqs.html">FAQs</a>
	& <a href="http://qa.netbeans.org/processes/cat/60/etiquette.html">Etiquette</a><br>
	<br>
	Jirka Kovalsky Discusses NetCAT 6.0 on <a
	href="http://blogs.sun.com/roumen/entry/netbeans_podcast_episode_37">NetBeans
	Podcast Episode 37</a><br>
	<br>
	</body>
	</html>