The tool you’ve been waiting for! Function: When you push the pedal a random input will be sent to the machine, and thereby your application. By default, a sample of error-prone inputs are available (e.g. ASCII 30, double-click, Unicode, beep) The nifty thing is to be able to do this rapidly, On-Demand, in unexpected situations, [...]
When I read about the “classic” test design techniques, I don’t recognize the way I come up with test ideas. Sure, the implicit equivalence partitioning is used pretty often, and I get happy the few times a state model is appropriate, but the testing I perform seldom has the unit/component focus that these techniques have. [...]
Exploring Requirements: Quality Before Design is an excellent book written by Donald C. Gause and Gerald M. Weinberg. It is primarily about requirements, but it is an excellent read for everyone involved in doing something that hasn’t been done before. As a software tester, it highlights, and helps, my own problems with understanding all important [...]
Over the years, one has read quite some text about software testing. Some things have (from various sources and experiences) become clear for me, and I’m surprised when seeing articles/presentations that don’t acknowledge these insights. These “truths” are now and then implicitly disregarded: * Requirements don’t include all important information * Testing includes more than [...]
EuroSTAR 2010 took place during the coldest Copenhagen November in 140 years. Being a program committee member it was a bit different, but not a lot; I met a lot of interesting people, spent too little time in the test lab, and listened to thought-worthy presentations (+ 11 Danish Alliance Lightning Talks.) The theme was [...]
It is very difficult to describe the process of synthesizing test ideas. It involves a multitude of information sources, a sense of what’s important, and a dose of creativity to come up with ingenious test ideas, and effective ways to execute them. The easiest way is to take the requirements document, re-phrase each item, and [...]
I have had some problems with the notion of Risk-Based Testing. I mean, aren’t all testing based on risk in some sense, making the term redundant? When using risk techniques, you come up with a list of areas to investigate first or most. But what about those items that are extremely rare, but with very [...]
It is a natural instinct for a tester to break down product information to elements that can be used in testing. It can be elaborations on a requirement, or insights from talking to a customer, or feature slogans from a web site et.al. Michael Bolton (and James Bach) calls this factoring – “Factoring is the [...]
I’m re-reading deBono’s excellent Lateral Thinking. Here is a Generate Alternatives exercise for software testers; try to think of as many different alternatives as possible. There is no right answer, the focus is to train yourself in re-structuring information. And at the same time come up with many different ideas that might generate fruitful thoughts. [...]
That applications have focus on the right place is essential to a good user experience. You have to trust that pressing Del on keyboard will have the intended effect. Problems with this is very common, at least on Windows, and especially in applications with dialogs and panels and stuff of different types. Addressing symptoms agressively [...]