Summer Interns: Jesse Harvey
Next up in our series of posts by PowerPoint's summer interns is Software Design Engineer Jesse Harvey.
Hello All,
My name is Jesse Harvey and I am in my seventh week as a Software Design Engineer in Test (SDET) intern with the PowerPoint team.
I was born and raised in a small town in Western New York. I am a 5th year student at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) in NY working on the Computer Engineering dual degree (BS & MS) program.
RIT is a very career oriented school, requiring students to complete a full year of co-op before graduation. I spent 6 months with Xerox in Henrietta, NY and continued to work part time with them during the school year. My team was responsible for creating and maintaining Linux/Unix drivers for multifunction devices in Xerox’s Office Group. I did a fair amount of C/C++ development, build automation, informal testing and result reporting. I spent last summer with Lehman Brothers in New York City doing J2EE development for internal reporting.
My interview experience was very similar to Nirav’s; an on campus interview followed by a flight to California for some interviews with the team. As things picked up throughout my internship, I was amazed at how integrated the testers were with the entire product cycle. I have been responsible for scheduling Feature Crew dates, reviewing PM Feature Design Specs and creating Test Design Specs. A typical day consists of a variety of testing and writing documentation, as well as automation and tool development. Being a SDET provides a great balance between the PM and Dev positions; I am able to work closely with the PM and provide my perspective on the product design and behavior and at the same time I get to do some development and programming for our automation system.
The experience of interning at Microsoft’s Silicon Valley Campus (SVC) has been great so far. While I have heard there are over 1000 interns at the Redmond campus, the Bay Area has only about 100. While there isn’t always something going on down here, having fewer interns allows us to form a smaller, closer knit group of friends. Of course you can’t beat the weather in Sunny California and the tech atmosphere of Silicon Valley is great for a nerdy college kid like me.
Like most college kids, I’m up for pretty much any adventure. I like playing sports and video games as well as watching movies, being outdoors and just hanging out with friends. There’s plenty to do in the SVC area. Our group of interns is always finding fun stuff to do, including sampling the local cuisine, making trips up to Fisherman’s Wharf/Golden Gate Bridge, checking out some of the local billiards clubs, kayaking around the local lake, playing a weekly game of poker and relaxing to some good movies.
I have already learned an incredible amount from the PowerPoint team and I’m very excited for the work I’ll be doing over the upcoming weeks.
