Testing & Quality Assurance

Testers catch breakage BEFORE it reaches daily drivers. Low status-barrier, high impact.

Tier 1 — ISO smoke test (~20 min, anyone)

Per new ISO announcement:

  1. VM install (fresh) → guided partitioning → first boot

  2. Walk post-install steps verbatim

  3. Note ANY deviation — typos included (Reporting Bugs Well format)

Matrix worth covering over time: UEFI vs BIOS · encrypted vs plain · dual-boot presence.

Tier 2 — Update canary (spare machine/VM)

Keep a disposable install updated aggressively; run your normal workload there days ahead of main machines:

sudo pacman -Syu ; journalctl -b -p warning   # read what grumbles
systemctl --failed                            # zero is the target number

Regressions reported with journals become Known Issues & Workarounds entries or same-day fixes.

Tier 3 — Feature-specific passes

Recovery Environment drills (quarterly per machine — verification drill), installer edge cases (dual-boot layouts), edition-specific flows (immutable updates, mobile flashing).

Tooling expectations

  • VMs: QEMU/virt-manager preferred (Virtual Machines on AcreetionOS)

  • Snapshot before risky test cycles even in VMs (habit building)

  • Logs archived per session: journalctl -b > test-session-date.log

Recognition

Consistent testers land in release notes credits — reliable eyes get maintainer trust, and maintainer trust is the on-ramp to commit access (Governance & Team Structure).