Engineering is often thought of as "behind-the-scenes" at Etsy, but even more folks don't even know of the QA Team's existence! This team plays a crucial role in the roll-out of new site features, and so they're a key answer to the frequently asked question, "When is X  site feature going to be launched?" And so, we decided to include this post from Annette, all about QA, in our All about Etsy FAQ series.

My name is Annette and I represent half of the Etsy QA Team (along with Alex). I'm very excited to be a part of the Etsy Community, and am looking forward to helping Etsy grow.

QA stands for Quality Assurance, and it's an important step along the path of development of a feature idea — especially  before that feature goes live on the site. The QA Team is responsible for reviewing the engineering specs for inconsistencies in design. This helps Engineers write complete code for all of the needed functionality of the new feature.

There are two important things for QA to monitor when we develop any new feature:

First, like a doctor's Hippocratic Oath, we assure that anything that is added to the site does not break anything that already exists. To save us the time of having to re-check that every single feature still works when something new is added, we setup a bunch of automated tests called our "Regression Suite." A Regression Suite is like pre-recorded actions that we can play back at any given time. Sometimes you might see our robot listing items. This means we're checking that this feature is still working.

Second, we make sure that the new feature itself is working properly. This includes comparing the spec we get from the Product team to what the Engineers deliver. We write test plans and test cases to try out all of these moving parts, and ensure the site is up to par. We are the final gatekeepers of feature code prior to releasing live on Etsy. Our goal is to make sure the code matches the original idea and works properly. 

When we begin a new engineering project, we make estimates about how long it may take to complete. We really want to give you neat tools and features that you can use right away, but sometimes things come up in the coding phases that cause us to delay releases of features until they are just right. Because these estimates are "internal estimates," and since they can change radically over the course of development, we can't release them publicly.

Another key feature of QA will be working with all the Etsy members, gathering feedback on features and suggestions for new ideas. In fact, the Etsy community itself has already been doing a lot of QA work in the past with the Engineering Team, spotting bugs and reporting them to the Admin. Now that we have our own internal QA team, we hope you'll be spotting a lot less bugs! If you want to communicate with QA, please setup a thread in the forums with your concerns. We are currently building out our automated Regression Suite, and want to make sure we include tests the users request. We've covered the basics, but any comments from you are helpful!

I'll be around in the forums, so please let me know if you have any QA related questions. Or just comment below and say hello!