How does it feel to test a compiler?

Thu, 08 Aug 2024 06:47:59 +0000

Hi, my name is Alex. I work as a QA engineer on the Kotlin/Native team. I’m often asked by friends and colleagues what it’s like to test a compiler, so I decided to write an article about it.

I’ll briefly talk about my path to compiler testing, the Kotlin/Native compiler, the specifics of the tasks, the tools I use, and the knowledge that helps me in my work.

I graduated with a bachelor’s and master’s degree in Software Engineering and then spent ten years in backend automation testing, including testing email backends (IMAP, POP3 protocols, email storage system, etc.), leading a testing team, and building test processes and test automation from scratch.

Alexander Zakharenko on foojay.io - Friends of OpenJDK

How does it feel to test a compiler?