Alpha testing my engagement ring

by Suw on February 20, 2007

Last Tuesday, as I was on my way up to Manchester for a conference, Kevin asked me to swing past Farringdon briefly. We met up at the tube station, and he produced from the depths of his venerable TedGlobal bag a small padded envelope. From this padded envelope, he produced a silver ring – the model of our engagement ring as made by our friend Nigel. It was very exciting, but as I was off to Manchester I didn't want to take it with me.
On Valentines Day, Kevin careful placed the stones in the model and sent me photos, just so we could get a feel for how it will look when it's finished.

I'm now alpha testing the bare model – wearing it on a day to day basis to ensure that it's the right size (so far, it does seem to be), and thinking about the user feedback that I'll give to Nigel. Obviously this will be an iterative process, drawing heavily from the ADoJ – 'Agile Development of Jewellery' – philosophy.

We're hoping to have a user focus group in March when Nigel's back from France and, with any luck, we'll be ready for beta testing, when will be ring is cast in white gold and the stones properly set, soon after that.
Of course, we won't go live til probably February next year, but I'll let you know what our developoment schedule is.

Anonymous February 21, 2007 at 12:25 am

God bless the geeks 🙂

Anonymous February 21, 2007 at 10:56 am

It looks beautiful, Suw.

Anonymous February 21, 2007 at 8:09 pm

Wow. You make it sound all so… romantic.

Anonymous February 23, 2007 at 3:49 pm

i am eager to hear how phase 1 of ring testing is going.

Anonymous February 23, 2007 at 5:11 pm

It is lovely, very unusual

Anonymous March 8, 2007 at 11:24 pm

Thank you all!
The alpha testing phase is going very well. I'm getting used to the ring on my finger, and it fits perfectly. The exact right size. I think the mountings may be a little big, but mainly I think that's just the central mounting. I also think that it's a wee bit angular in profile. Looking forward to meeting up with Nigel and discussing all this with him. Not sure when we get the beta version, but looking forward to it!

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