Testing in Meteor is going to become a lot easier in Meteor 1.3.
6 Likes
I agree with you that there may be a certain tendency into that direction in tech industry. But to be honest, I really have a problem understanding why you consider terms like ācucumberā and ājasmineā as being sexist?! Ok, I can think of a sexual connotation that you could give the term ācucumberā, but I would never had even thought about such a connotation when I heard it. And ājasmineā might just as well be the name of the girlfriend of the developer. In this case, Iād rather see this as a nice appreciation and not as being sexist. Maybe we should ask the devs why they named the frameworks like this? Iām curious now 
2 Likes
I normally donāt feed trolls, but Iām making an exception in this case since it appears I am being accused of giving something a sexist name.
Allow me to explain the origin of the name āCucumberā. On the 8th of April 2008 I was writing the first lines of code for a new BDD tool I had an idea for. I didnāt have a name for it, so I asked my wife who happened to be sitting next to me. She is a human rights lawyer and doesnāt know the first thing about software. In the spur of the moment she exclaimed Cucumber! She just liked the word. At first I thought the name was silly, but before I knew it the ruby open source community ran with it and the name stuck. Today itās implemented in a dozen different programming languages and used by an estimated community of 1M users.
@awatson1978 I would appreciate if you could clarify a couple of things for me:
- Do you find the name āCucumberā sexist?
- If so, please help me understand by what definition of āsexistā
All the best,
Aslak HellesĆøy
Creator of Cucumber
23 Likes
Oh great, hereās comes the PC-Policeā¦
3 Likes
I donāt think the names are sexist, but one can see a sexual innuendo as cucumbers and (jasmine) flowers can be viewed as symbols for reproductive organs. Freudās been saying this for years.
While I think she was off the mark in this particular case, the fact of the matter is that no matter how bad things are, the dominant group is always oblivious to the experience of others.
Polls are nothing new and so you can pick any decade in history and any privileged group (via gender, race, religion, wealth, etc.) and you will find that the vast majority of people in the dominant group answers questions of discrimination with āthere is no problemā, āthey get what they deserveā, āit may have been bad before but not nowā, ātheyāre just being too sensitiveā, etc. This time itās not different and, like all throughout history, most men would say sexism isnāt a problem, women are just being too PC.
I regret awatsonās comments because they only strengthen menās blissfully ignorant position that sexism isnāt that big of deal. So at risk of patronizing, Iāll cut her some slack given the history of our society and specially our industry.
8 Likes
If we have to address such silly speculation that the above projects are sexist, then yes it becomes a matter of political correctness in my opinion. Iām sure if I look hard enough, I could deem the story of Troy and a trojan horse to be sexist & that it should be wiped from history books. I wonāt, hence my comment, though I appreciate you taking the time to man-splain things to me.
2 Likes
I rest my caseā¦
Good thing youāre not a lawyer. 
If you keep demonstrating privilege and obliviousness with every post then thereās nothing to do but to point it out
Thatā¦ is sort of exactly what I hope we avoid in the future.
Lookā¦ lest anybody think Iām a prude or stick-in-the-mud, I donāt give a crap what kind of apps people write. Seriously. Want to write a chat roulette app or a real-time porn site? I could care less. My portfolio includes embryology and obstetrics apps; and is about graphic as they come.
The issue is when content starts filtering into the API and official docs. Then my clients and I start to mind.
Because hereās the thingā¦ working in healthcare, we actually deal with patients and naked bodies. My clients have apps that are responsible for neonatal ultrasound screenings, mammogram screenings, prostate screenings, in-vitro fertilization matchingā¦ And when you work with such app content; it becomes real important to have a clean technical jargon without innuendo. Peopleās minds are going to be going to be thinking about sex anyhow. Adding an API that has innuendo just adds fuel to the fire.
And to be clear, we came to Meteor with itās promise of being the .NET of Javascript. So weāre looking for a clean API and clean syntax. Not an API and packages that have innuendoes. We have enough problems training and managing staff to be professional as it is.
I actually thought you were making a perfectly reasonable point. Itās an issue of going with the lowest-possible common denominator, and simply giving some thought to whether language can be misconstrued and offend someone.
In particular, I thought the point about Gagarin was particularly insightful. The execute() syntax isā¦ imperfect. And along with the subject matter of the dutch painting that Nightwatch is named for (depicting the armed guards of a dutch town), thereās a slightly violent imagery associated between Gagarin and Nightwatch. Itās a legitimate criticism; and something that Iād like to clean up eventually.
And, like I said in an above postā¦ I and my clients could care less about the underlying technologies. Hereās an example where we took the practicalmeteor:sinon package, which doesnāt have any sexualized language, but does have the spy/mock language, and we aliased it to use language specified by the FDA:
It only becomes sexist when someone starts layering in language like āspyā and āmockā. If the libraries that were being promoted were ācucumberā, ātomatoā, āceleryā, and ākaleā, this conversation wouldnāt be happening.
In of itself, no. But the term is generally understood to have phallic imagery, and is prone to innuendo. I get itā¦ sex sells. No harm in that.
The problem is that somewhere along the way, Cucumber and Jasmine got paired up (Jasmine has yonic flower imagery) and promoted as the recommended testing packages; along with the Spy and Mock apis from the Sinon library.
So for the past year, the forums have been filling with language and comments like below:
- How do I use cucumber?
- Which should I use? Cucumber or jasmine?
- Cucumber is a delight to use.
- Iām a cucumber man, myself.
- Cucumber isnāt working, any suggestions?
- Iām having trouble using jasmine to mock our app.
- Jasmine spys not working; help.
- Hereās a screencast of the cucumber tests.
And as I stated before, some of us have clients that work in healthcare and enterprise environments. And the last thing I or my clients ever want to have to deal with is an email from an intern, student, new hire, or collaborator asking for us to show them how to use their cucumber (tests). Because thatās an email away from getting misconstrued and sent to the HR department.
So we actively choose NOT to use that package. Or jasmine. Or Sinon. Because it causes problems. They are not best practices for the healthcare/biotech/medical industries.
By comparison, lets consider Mocha and Nightwatch; neither of which have innuendos:
- How do I use nightwatch?
- Which should I use? Mocha or nightwatch?
- Mocha is a delight to use.
- Iām a nightwatch woman, myself.
- Mocha isnāt working, any suggestions?
- Hereās a screencast of the nightwatch tests.
See? No innuendos. No HR problems.
Actually, no. As I said above, I and my clients couldnāt care less if other companies want to publish porn or banana plugins. Weāre not asking or telling anybody else to do anything.
What we are doing, is raising the bar and leading by example. Weāre putting out an alternative testing solution that doesnāt have inappropriate language. And weāre stating that, going forward, weāre staking out a moral high-ground, and offering an alternative solution that is FDA compatible, and doesnāt have APIs or packages that have language that can be construed as having sexual or harassing overtones.
And we think that should be reflected in the Meteor Guide.
1 Like
Just so you know, when you say āI and my clients could care lessā, that means that do care about it to some degree and could in fact actually care a little less about it. I believe the phrase is ācouldnāt care lessā.
I personally donāt see such a moral high-ground in this instance. Stringing project names together to form innuendos is simply unfair imo. When I say the word Cucumber, I donāt see phallic imagery, the same way the story of Troy & a trojan horse donāt suggest sexual intercourse to me. Thereās a case for sexism within the tech industry for sure, no oneās denying that (I donāt see the construction trade, for example, making as much of an effort as the tech industry to correct this), but I simply canāt agree with your point. And just because I donāt agree with it, doesnāt make me sexist or a bigot like some would like to claim.
1 Like
Start with that the next time a woman talks about sexism and not with the typical āOh great, hereās comes the PC-Policeā¦ā
Dammit, I guess I just āmansplainedā it again (whatever you think that is)
2 Likes
Yeah, because itās ok to call other professionnals āsexistā or accusing them of using āharassing languageā or being from the ādominant groupā, just because they use a tool which is called Jasmine and another which is called Cucumber.
We live in a mad world.
4 Likes
Iām very grateful that the MDG are looking to recommend Chimp in the Meteor guide. As the MDG have alluded, Velocity is on itās final legs and it will be phased out with the new testing additions in Meteor 1.3. The best part for me is that Chimp was born from Velocity, and therefore a part of Velocity will continue to be a part of the Meteor testing story.
As the person that created the first port of Cucumber to Meteor, and as a BDD practitioner and a long-time fan, I do wish that @aslakhellesoy was here under better circumstances, to see some of the opportunities and magic that exist within the Meteor ecosystem, and the very supportive community. Please do drop by again (and again), I know I would love to hear more from you and thank you for all your pioneering work.
I strongly urge my fellow Meteor professionals and enthusiasts to let this thread rest and I look forward to some great constructive conversations going forward.
10 Likes
I strongly urge my fellow Meteor professionals and enthusiasts to let this thread rest and I look forward to some great constructive conversations going forward.
This. Iām taking @samās advice. I had a comment typed up to chime in, but I deleted it and am writing this instead.
Personally, I wish I was more skilled (and had more time) so that I could contribute as much as @sam and @awatson1978 (and others) have to this great community. Not a day goes by that @awatson1978ās atom.io package doesnāt save me tons of time.
Looking forward to 1.3 and smooth testing!
6 Likes
Not at all, but we do need to recommend something in the guide, thatās all. As I pointed out, thereās very little Meteor specific in E2E testing and there are a wealth of great tools out there, so people can easily use whatever they like and follow the same basic approach weāll outline in the guide.
At the end of the day there will be a certain percentage of people who just want to be told something that works so they can focus on building the tests rather than picking the technology (Iād be in that boat too if I wasnāt writing the guide, honestly), and so showing them a single option rather than saying āthese 5 things all work well, go pick oneā is really what we need to do.
These are completely standard terms in the industry, I donāt think thereās any way to avoid using them without just confusing people.
4 Likes
If by ok you mean countless of posts telling her sheās off base (as is the case in this thread) then yes, it is ok.
or being from the ādominant groupā
If youāre a man working in IT then you are in the dominant group, otherwise there wouldnāt be sexism and discrimination against women. Itās not something to apologize for, itās something to acknowledge and try to correct.
3 Likes
For two years I work everyday with Cucumber and Jasmine, in an financial enterprise environment, where everyone wears a suit. I never thought Cucumber and Jasmine could have any kind of sexual connotation, and no one ever complained or thought it was not appropriate to use them for their name.
Somehow, and please do not take it personal, I think you are looking too deep on possible word meanings and relations between words. Most of developers just see a technology/language/framework, and not even the actual object they represent. If I think of Cucumber in the programming context, I donāt even imagine an actual cucumber. Definitely, not some sexual relation between Cucumber, Jasmine and Velocity.
Honestly, Cucumber and Jasmine are great ideas that represent great work, and their names are out of your control or your clients control. Therefore, I would try explaining this to my clients, if this is an issue for them.
5 Likes