On Monday, we started our eight week internship here at GRAYBOX after finishing up at Epicodus - a local coding bootcamp. Our program was spent studying Ruby, Rails, Angular, and Javascript. However, the developers here at GRAYBOX work primarily in PHP using the Symfony framework. Both of us walked in knowing that there would most likely be a very steep learning curve, and expected to be thrown into the deep end. However, members of the GRAYBOX team made themselves available for questions and were very supportive.
We spent a couple of chaotic days absorbing the basic ins and outs of working here, and examining some of the code that GRAYBOX uses to run their internal processes. Luckily, several of the developers made sure to take the time to give us help and support as it was needed. Brett, who was also also a previous Epicodus alumni, helped us set up our programming environments, and helped us get into the code base that we would be need for upcoming projects. Daniele, one of the senior developers, also took time to give us a run-down of Symfony which is the framework that they use. He also introduced us to the SOLID design principles that are used in object oriented development.
Aside from looking at the code and exploring PHP, Jacques helped Bryce learn more about GRAYBOX's QA methodology and tools used. Jacques outlined how to build a test plan, different types of testing, and Jira configuration. Also, he provided a Ghost Inspector tutorial, access to the account, and advised Bryce to begin exploratory testing on the MyIDCare dev website. Bryce spent much of the day running tests and familiarizing himself with Ghost, testing the features on various pages.
While Bryce was exploring QA, Anna-Marie spent a lot of time digging into the Accelo API, which GRAYBOX uses to run a lot of their internal process. She spent time learning how to filter and manipulate the data to get the necessary information for future projects. She also jumped into organizing pre-made templates to help with their development process.
We both feel lucky to be here. We couldn't have asked for a better real world experience of what it feels like to join a dynamic, fast-growing company. The folks here are willing to help when needed, but also expect us to be self starters, and to some degree figure things out ourselves. It's an experience that we definitely appreciate, and we are excited to learn more about Symfony and dig into the code base more fully next week.