The gap tests cannot close

Everything so far checks behaviour. None of it checks whether something looks right.

A test can confirm that the answer text is on the page. It cannot tell you the answer is
white on white, that the buttons are off the edge of a phone screen, or that the question is
below the fold so the student never sees it.

Three ways to check a screen

1. Look at it yourself. Still the best method. Open the page. Click things. On your
phone, not only your laptop.

2. Let the agent drive a browser. Many agents can open a page, click, and read what is
there. Antigravity does this as a normal part of its work; other tools can do it too. This
turns “does the review flow work” into something the agent can check on its own.

Open /review in a browser. Click "Show answer", then click "Easy".
Tell me what the page shows afterwards, and whether the card changed
in the database.

3. Screenshots. Ask for one and look. Ten seconds, and it catches the layout problems
that no test will ever see.

The phone check

Your plan said Recall must work on a phone screen. That was a real requirement, so it needs
a real check.

Set the browser window to 390 pixels wide and take a screenshot of /review.

Look for: buttons off the edge, text too small, the answer needing a scroll, the three
buttons too close together to tap accurately.

This is the requirement from Lesson 2.5 that is easiest to write and easiest to forget.

What to look for that tests never catch

  • Can you tell what to do without being told?
  • Is the important thing the biggest thing on screen?
  • Does it look broken while it is loading?
  • What does it look like with a very long question? Try one of 300 characters.
  • What does it look like with no cards at all?

That last one is worth doing every time. Empty screens are where most apps look unfinished,
because they get built last and looked at least.

Try this before the next lesson

  1. Open Recall on your actual phone. Write down three things that are wrong.
  2. Add a card with a very long question. Does anything overflow?
  3. Ask your agent to open the review page and describe what it sees. Is its description
    accurate?
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