James, Michael and Matt all have a testing “kit” of “challenges” that they carry around that make testers think about testing. Which is all well and good, but is not going to help them much when on a customer site. (Well, it might distract the client while they think about the solution to a particularly difficult problem…).

The tracing paper post got me thinking about what I would put in an actual testing kit that I could take on-site and be effective.

So with 3 days of thought and without actually building or using it, this is what I would put in a testing kit.

  • To start with, you need something to carry everything in. Since I don’t picture myself having to fly to any client sites, it can be slightly larger and not have to survive the chaos of a luggage system, just the trunk of at my feet on the train. Give that I can use a plastic file box which you can get for under $20 at an office supply store. The things I like about this one is that it has a flat(ish) lid which could double as a desk, the snap-close lid, the handle and the compartments on top are a bonus.
  • tracing paper
  • Whiteboard markers (a couple colours) and a brush; you would be amazed how many places have non-working markers on the shelves of their whiteboard
  • A digital camera — for capturing whiteboard content or even screenshots
  • A couple different lengths of regular ethernet cable
  • A crossover ethernet cable
  • A wireless router; I know how to configure them securely and don’t like cables. Of course, paranoid IT departments often will nix this one I suspect
  • A notebook
  • A couple pens and pencils
  • A calculator
  • And of course, there is a laptop to run things on. I’m currently thinking either a nicely equipped MacBook or ThinkPad. The MacBook is unix based and is oh-so-pretty, but the ThinkPad is almost bombproof. Regardless it needs a significant amount of memory to be able to run at least one VM instead of polluting the main install. It would need to have some sort of padded sleeve; either commercially made or you could make yourself one out of an old foam sleeping bag pad if you are poor.
  • Nice headphones. Not the bud style, but cover-the-ear with noise cancellation
  • A laminated set of cheat sheets (or 3)

And to both date myself and use a local cultural reference, the one thing that any testing kit needs but won’t actually go in the box is your brain.

What else would you add, or remove from the kit?