My overall goal is to ensure all assigned features/code has been validated. What does that mean? Builds have to be run through security, localization, core functionality, om, stress, performance, accessibility, integration,and many other types of tests. Some things take a lot of time… some parts can be automated, others require hand validation. This is just the “testing” portion of a tester’s job. Other tasks include reviewing specs, chasing down customer problems, lobbying for design changes/usage scenarios/integration points. No matter how you slice it, the workload is quite heavy.

Now let’s look at the schedule side of things. If a project is slated to take 100 days, I can guarantee that the workload is more in the 120 day range. Inherently, 100 scheduled days should have the same number of associated work days but the reality is that something always pops up in the middle of the cycle… sick leave, big nasty bugs which require design rework, vacations, other internal process headaches, and worst of all, overly optimistic planning by the management teams. This effectively means that I, as a tester, have to find ways to optimize my process - better, faster automation… better design analysis and review… finding bugs sooner than later… etc. Bottom line - it can be very hard to complete feature testing in the scheduled time.

Now… what about Easter eggs? Well, I don’t want them. I have to sign off on every bit of code that is assigned to me; hence, I personally want everything to be of the best quality *and* of use to the customer. I don’t have the time to spend testing something that takes away from the core functionality. I don’t want to spend time reviewing, testing, automating something that doesn’t make the product better. Why? I’m booked solid… any more time at the office takes away from my social life. It’s all about balance - if I am already working way too many hours, why waste my “extra time” at work when I should be far away from the office?

At the end of the day, every line of code has to get a tester’s approval. We don’t have the luxury of “overlooking” anything, which is how Easter eggs have traditionally made their way into a product. Testing is a core piece of product development at Microsoft. Look at the dev/test ratio - many teams push for a 1:1 ratio. Compare that to other companies where values range any from 5:1 to an unbelievable 70:1. In a world where testers are not utilized or held as strictly accountable, I can see how EEs proliferate.

Am I being a bit too stodgy? Maybe. My product is for business use. As such, the “fun” stuff is enabling new and exciting customer scenarios. I love showing customers features … and I take comfort in knowing they are well tested and, hence, stable and reliable. I love seeing a customer’s eyes light up when they realize what they can do with a feature. I don’t ever want someone coming back to me after RTM with a message that literally translates into “we have to take a hotfix because instead of testing X, you and others were playing with an Easter egg”. There’s enough headaches worrying about the legitimate things that may have slipped past….

I’m sure my opinion would change if I worked on game or entertainment app where the objective is different. At the end of day, I want an end of day - I want to complete my “normally” scheduled tasks… and go home.

Okay, fine, I can see how easter eggs would be more ‘relevant’ or perhaps even more appropriate [sigh] in games and not Office apps. But the whole handwringing about “An hour spent writing and QA’ing a bouncing happy face across the screen is an hour that could have been spent adding in another useless ‘productivity feature’” just makes me cringe. I wish folks would lighten up. We’d have a lot fewer stress-related heart attacks and a lot less corporate unpleasantness overall. Fired for Easter Eggs. Bah, humbug!

An easter egg that is produced as part of an extra project — say like Google’s 20% stuff — isn’t nor should it be — impacting their shipping cycle. If an easter egg is throwing shipping schedules off track then you guys are right, they have much bigger fish to fry.

Man, I’m seeing this is a little coding thing … a couple lines of code maybe for some key combination … heck I’ve seen Tetris implemented in a few lines of code.

They are even putting easter eggs in DVDs. This isn’t rocket science here.

At the end of the day if there was a simple way to increase user enjoyment, not piss off big customers, not waste development time, still have quality code and get it all documented so that it truly was a win-win-win situation, I can’t imagine anyone actually being fired for it.

But the logistics involved in making that kind of situation happen are mind-boggling. What part of the OS is “safe” enough to include an easter egg, in an area that wouldn’t affect corporate customers? What part can be modified and documented in such a way that the change doesn’t affect any other app (ever)?

I can see the case for easter eggs more clearly in other apps (even Office, as long as they’re removed for corporate clients). In fact, if I ran a software development company I’d likely champion for them as part of team-building. But I’d also be very aware of when they are and when they aren’t appropriate.

And, to me, delivering easter eggs to corporate customers isnt’ appropriate and so you’re either creating a separate version of software for non-corporate customers (and thereby reducing your “benefit”) but in approved easter eggs someone ultimately needs to be responsible for the maintenance of the code.

I guess as a developer I’m all for them. As a manager / marketing guy I’m on the fence. And if I were a business owner I’d be cautiously optimistic on them.

But, if I was a PM at Microsoft, I would be totally against them because there wouldn’t be a way to make them happen without risk (corporate, political, etc).

“Who knows, it might actually get some users even more curious and excited about Vista. These Easter Eggs can go through Project Managers so that programmers aren’t putting in backdoors into people’s systems or doing anything illegal and/or that would get the company in trouble.”

I did read where Larry said that it’s impossible for each programmer writing an easter egg can know what they are doing to the other 15 million lines of code. It can’t be audited to prevent against other unexpected results.

That part makes sense, but really doesn’t encourage me that they actually have a handle on the core code. This is a much worse sign if they can’t audit and test for a small, simple easter egg, how can users trust what they are doing with PnP and the hundreds of other vastly more complicated things released that have been exploited by malicious hackers.

You have more marketing savvy and can see the bigger picture beyond users here, I think. People are trying to find reasons to like Microsoft again and things like this just make them look like a bunch of corporate stiffs.