The Test Tribe 27th Porto Meetup - From Vibe Coding to BDD as Engine of Shift-Left QA

The Test Tribe 27th Porto Meetup

Testing is no longer just about catching bugs after the fact - it's about how teams think, build, and collaborate from the very first idea. This edition of The Test Tribe's Porto Meetup brings together two contrasting but complementary perspectives on that shift: one exploring how AI lets testers build their own tools in minutes (and the risks that come with that speed), and the other showing how BDD turns QA into a co-author of the solution from day one. Join us at Mindera for an evening of sharp insight, honest trade-offs, and great conversation with Porto's growing engineering and QA community. 

Event Details

• Date: 8th July 2026
• Time: 18:30 (Portugal Time)
• Venue: Mindera, R. de Gonçalo Cristóvão 347 s404, 4000-270 Porto

Session 1: Driven by Vibes: A Tool Maker's Dream

Speaker: Gil Coelho, Scrum Knight at Critical TechWorks

What if you could turn any idea into a functional QA tool in just a few minutes, without being limited by the barriers of traditional coding? Welcome to Vibe Coding. In this talk, Gil explores how AI has transformed every tester into a potential Tool Maker, using the live creation of a VS Code plugin as an example. But it's not all good vibes - the talk also examines the hidden risks of this approach, from accelerated technical debt to AI hallucinations, and discusses why the role of QA becomes more critical than ever: ensuring that software generated through "intuition" is, in fact, reliable.

Key Takeaways

• Vibe Coding
• Plugins
• Personal/Team Tools

Speaker Bio

An engineer by passion and a worker by necessity, Gil Coelho has been a Software Engineer and Scrum Master at Critical TechWorks for over five years - a joint venture between Critical Software and BMW. He graduated in Electrical Engineering in 2014, and has since worked at a computer vision research center and later at a company specialising in testing systems and assembly lines for the automotive industry.

Like many people in the tech industry, he entered this field hoping to become Iron Man one day, and still dreams of creating his own successful game. He was the co-founder and president of a Toastmasters Club and is a former Red Cross first responder. Looking for a more active lifestyle and a bit of competition, he took up a federated sport and became a federated chess player. He has a great passion for games and movies, and developed a love for reading thanks to his travel companion.

Connect with Gil: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gilcoelho

Session 2: Quality Doesn't Wait: BDD as the Engine of Shift-Left QA

Speaker: Gil Ferro, Engineering Lead at AUTODOC

Behavior-Driven Development (BDD) is not just a development practice - it is an approach that aligns product, engineering, and quality. In this session, Gil explores how BDD brings quality to the very beginning of the development lifecycle, eliminates ambiguity in requirements and rework between development cycles, and transforms the role of QA into a co-author of the solution from day one.

Key Takeaways

• BDD as a shared language between business, product, and engineering
• What shift-left truly means and the evolving role of QA
• The role of QA at every stage of the BDD lifecycle
• Living documentation: tests as the single source of truth for the system
• BDD in the age of AI

Speaker Bio

Gil Ferro is an Engineering Lead at AUTODOC, where he leads cross-functional engineering teams in the B2B domain. He holds a Master's degree in Network and Computer Systems Engineering from FCUP and spent two years as a researcher at INESC-TEC before pursuing a career in product engineering and technical leadership, with roles at Jumia and Viz.ai. In recent years, he has focused on the continuous improvement of delivery processes, the adoption of Agile practices, and strengthening collaboration between engineering, product, and quality. He is a strong advocate of shift-left as a cultural enabler and has applied BDD as a tool for team alignment from requirements definition through delivery.

Connect with Gil: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gilcferro

Why You Should Attend

• Discover the practical realities of "Vibe Coding" - its power as well as its hidden risks for QA
• See a live demo of building a functional QA tool (a VS Code plugin) from scratch
• Understand how BDD eliminates ambiguity and rework by aligning product, engineering, and QA from day one
• Learn what shift-left truly means and how QA's role evolves across the BDD lifecycle
• Explore how living documentation can become the single source of truth for your systems

About The Test Tribe

The Test Tribe is the world's largest software testing community, empowering testers globally since 2018. With 700+ events and 150K+ members across 130+ countries, we bring testers together to learn, grow, and connect through meetups, conferences, cohorts, masterclasses, and more.

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